| C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917. | | | | Lucy Larcom |
| | | | All flowers of Spring are not May’s own; |
| The crocus cannot often kiss her; |
| The snow-drop, ere she comes, has flown— |
| The earliest violets always miss her. |
| 1 |
| | Because its myriad glimmering plumes |
| Like a great army’s stir and wave; |
| Because its golden billows blooms, |
| The poor man’s barren walks to lave: |
| Because its sun-shaped blossoms show |
| How souls receive the light of God, |
| And unto earth give back that glow— |
| I thank Him for the Goldenrod. |
| 2 |
| | Grief is a tattered tent |
| Where through God’s light doth shine. |
| 3 |
| | June falls asleep upon her bier of flowers; |
| In vain are dewdrops sprinkled o’er her, |
| In vain would fond winds fan her back to life, |
| Her hours are numbered on the floral dial. |
| 4 |
| | The children with the streamlets sing, |
| When April stops at last her weeping; |
| And every happy growing thing |
| Laughs like a babe just roused from sleeping. |
| 5 |
| | The land is dearer for the sea, |
| The ocean for the shore. |
| 6 |
| | Thou hastenest down, between the hills to meet me at the road, |
| The secret scarcely lisping of thy beautiful abode |
| Among the pines and mosses of yonder shadowy height, |
| Where thou dost sparkle into song, and fill the woods with light. |
| 7 |
| | When April steps aside for May, |
| Like diamonds all the rain-drops glisten; |
| Fresh violets open every day: |
| To some new bird each hour we listen. |
| 8 |
| The peach-bud glows, the wild bee hums, and wind-flowers wave in graceful gladness. | 9 |
| To her bier comes the year, not with weeping and distress, as mortals do; but to guide her way to it, all the trees have torches lit. | 10 | | |
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