Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry. 1904.

III. The Seasons

Spring

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892)

DIP down upon the northern shore,

O sweet new-year, delaying long:

Thou dost expectant Nature wrong;

Delaying long, delay no more.

What stays thee from the clouded noons,

Thy sweetness from its proper place?

Can trouble live with April days,

Or sadness in the summer moons?

Bring orchis, bring the foxglove spire,

The little speedwell’s darling blue,

Deep tulips dashed with fiery dew,

Laburnums, dropping-wells of fire.

O thou, new-year, delaying long,

Delayest the sorrow in my blood,

That longs to burst a frozen bud,

And flood a fresher throat with song.

Now fades the last long streak of snow;

Now bourgeons every maze of quick

About the flowering squares, and thick

By ashen roots the violets blow.

Now rings the woodland loud and long,

The distance takes a lovelier hue,

And drowned in yonder living blue

The lark becomes a sightless song.

Now dance the lights on lawn and lea,

The flocks are whiter down the vale,

And milkier every milky sail

On winding stream or distant sea;

Where now the sea-mew pipes, or dives

In yonder greening gleam, and fly

The happy birds, that change their sky

To build and brood, that live their lives

From land to land; and in my breast

Spring wakens too; and my regret

Becomes an April violet,

And buds and blossoms like the rest.