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The Complete Poems of Christina Rossetti

A variorum edition: Edited, with textual notes and introductions, by R. W. Crump

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48

ANOTHER SPRING.

If I might see another Spring
I'd not plant summer flowers and wait:
I'd have my crocuses at once,
My leafless pink mezereons,
My chill-veined snowdrops, choicer yet
My white or azure violet,
Leaf-nested primrose; anything
To blow at once, not late.
If I might see another Spring
I'd listen to the daylight birds
That build their nests and pair and sing,
Nor wait for mateless nightingale;
I'd listen to the lusty herds,
The ewes with lambs as white as snow,
I'd find out music in the hail
And all the winds that blow.
If I might see another Spring—
Oh stinging comment on my past
That all my past results in “if”—
If I might see another Spring
I'd laugh today, today is brief;
I would not wait for anything:
I'd use today that cannot last,
Be glad today and sing.