XCII

TO my quick ear the leaves conferred;

The bushes they were bells;

I could not find a privacy

From Nature’s sentinels.

In cave if I presumed to hide,

The walls began to tell;

Creation seemed a mighty crack

To make me visible.

XCI

MORNING is the place for dew,

   Corn is made at noon,

After dinner light for flowers,

   Dukes for setting sun!

XC

A MURMUR in the trees to note,

Not loud enough for wind;

A star not far enough to seek,

Nor near enough to find;

A long, long yellow on the lawn,

A hubbub as of feet;

Not audible, as ours to us,

But dapperer, more sweet;

A hurrying home of little men

To houses unperceived,—

All this, and more, if I should tell,

Would never be believed.

Of robins in the trundle bed

How many I espy

Whose nightgowns could not hide the wings,

Although I heard them try!

But then I promised ne’er to tell;

How could I break my word?

So go your way and I ’ll go mine,—

No fear you ’ll miss the road.

LXXXIX

NOT knowing when the dawn will come

I open every door;

Or has it feathers like a bird,

Or billows like a shore?

LXXXVIII

WE like March, his shoes are purple,

He is new and high;

Makes he mud for dog and peddler,

Makes he forest dry;

Knows the adder’s tongue his coming,

And begets her spot.

Stands the sun so close and mighty

That our minds are hot.

News is he of all the others;

Bold it were to die

With the blue-birds buccaneering

On his British sky.

LXXXVII

DEAR March, come in!

How glad I am!

I looked for you before.

Put down your hat—

You must have walked—

How out of breath you are!

Dear March, how are you?

And the rest?

Did you leave Nature well?

Oh, March, come right upstairs with me,

I have so much to tell!

I got your letter, and the bird’s;

The maples never knew

That you were coming,—I declare,

How red their faces grew!

But, March, forgive me—

And all those hills

You left for me to hue;

There was no purple suitable,

You took it all with you.

Who knocks? That April!

Lock the door!

I will not be pursued!

He stayed away a year, to call

When I am occupied.

But trifles look so trivial

As soon as you have come,

That blame is just as dear as praise

And praise as mere as blame.

LXXXVI

A LADY red upon the hill

   Her annual secret keeps;

A lady white within the field

   In placid lily sleeps!

The tidy breezes with their brooms

   Sweep vale, and hill, and tree!

Prithee, my pretty housewives!

   Who may expected he?

The neighbors do not yet suspect!

   The woods exchange a smile—

Orchard, and buttercup, and bird—

   In such a little while!

And yet how still the landscape stands,

   How nonchalant the wood,

As if the resurrection

   Were nothing very odd!

LXXXV

A LIGHT exists in spring

   Not present on the year

At any other period.

   When March is scarcely here

A color stands abroad

   On solitary hills

That silence cannot overtake,

   But human nature feels.

It waits upon the lawn;

   It shows the furthest tree

Upon the furthest slope we know;

   It almost speaks to me.

Then, as horizons step,

   Or noons report away,

Without the formula of sound,

   It passes, and we stay:

A quality of loss

   Affecting our content,

As trade had suddenly encroached

   Upon a sacrament.

LXXXIV

SHE slept beneath a tree

Remembered but by me.

I touched her cradle mute;

She recognized the foot,

Put on her carmine suit,—

And see!

LXXXIII

THE springtime’s pallid landscape

Will glow like bright bouquet,

Though drifted deep in parian

The village lies to-day.

The lilacs, bending many a year,

With purple load will hang;

The bees will not forget the time

Their old forefathers sang.

The rose will redden in the bog,

The aster on the hill

Her everlasting fashion set,

And covenant gentians frill,

Till summer folds her miracle

As women do their gown,

Or priests adjust the symbols

When sacrament is done.