he meadow, like another sea, shall flower,
And all the earth be song and singing shower;
While watching, in some hollow of the grass
By the sea's edge, I may behold her stand,
With rosy feet, upon the yellow sand,
Pause in a dream, and to the woodland pass.

"AH! DID YOU EVER HEAR THE SPRING"

Ah! did you ever hear the Spring
Calling you through the snow,
Or hear the little blackbird sing
Inside its egg--or go
To that green land where grass begins,
Each tiny seed, to grow?

O have you heard what none has heard,
Or seen what none has seen;
O have you been to that strange land
Where no one else has been!

APRIL

April, half-clad in flowers and showers,
Walks, like a blossom, o'er the land;
She smiles at May, and laughing takes
The rain and sunshine hand in hand.

So gay the dancing of her feet,
So like a garden her soft breath,
So sweet the smile upon her face,
She charms the very heart of death.

The young moon in a trance she holds
Captive in clouds of orchard bloom,
She snaps her fingers at the grave,
And laughs into the face of doom.

Yet in her gladness lurks a fear,
In all her mirth there breathes a sigh,
So soon her pretty flowers are gone--
And ah! she is too young to die!

MAY IS BUILDING HER HOUSE

May is building her house. With apple blooms
She is roofing over the glimmering rooms;
Of the oak and the beech hath she builded its beams,
And, spinning all day at her secret looms,
With arras of leaves each wind-swayed wall
She pictureth over, and peopleth it all
With echoes and dreams,
And singing of streams.

May is building her house of petal and blade;
Of the roots of the oak is the flooring made,
With a carpet of mosses and lichen and clover,
Each small miracle over and over,
And tender, travelling green things strayed.

Her windows the morning and evening star,
And her rustling doorways, ever ajar
With the coming and going
Of fair things blowing,
The thresholds of the four winds are.

May is building her house. From the dust of things
She is making the songs and the flowers and the wings;
From October's tossed and trodden gold
She is making the young year out of the old;
Yea! out of winter's flying sleet
She is making all the summer sweet,
And the brown leaves spurned of November's feet
She is changing back again to spring's.

SHADOW

When leaf and flower are newly made,
And bird and butterfly and bee
Are at their sum