Augusta Webster

A Song of a Spring-Time

TOO rash, sweet birds, spring is not spring;
   Sharp winds are fell in east and north;
   Late blossoms die for peeping forth; Rains numb, frost blights;
Days are unsunned, storms tear the nights;
   The tree-buds wilt before they swell.
   Frosts in the buds, and frost-winds fell: And you, you sing.

But let no song be sweet in spring;
   Spring is but hope for after-time,
   And what is hope but spring-tide rime? But blights, but rain?
Spring wanes unsunned, and sunless wane
   The hopes false spring-tide bore to die.
   Spring's answer is the March wind's sigh: And you, you sing.