 | Vigil and vision |  |
PROPHETS OF THE PRIME.
1. CROCUSES.
BUT yesterday the world without was white;And now the sap begins to stir anew.
The grass is starred with cups of gold and blue,
Lilac and silver, flakes of living light,
As of a rainbow fallen in the night.
The crocuses are up, a cheery crew:
Weary of tarrying the Winter through,
They might not wait till Spring for the sun's sight.
Vaunt-couriers of the world's awakening,
That quicken, in the middle Winter's woe,
Our hearts with your kaleidoscopic show,
Ye mind us of hope's seed in every thing,
How Winter wan there's none but hath its Spring,
Nor soul so sad but joy again may know.
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2. HYACINTHS.
WHAT are these bright and glorious of array,An army as with banners, risen to break
The Winter's rearward battle and to make
High proclamation in each garden-way
Of all the flowering witcheries of May,
Myriads of summer-thoughts that overtake
The land with sudden splendour and awake
The dumb wan world unto the morrowing day?
These are the visions of the slumbering earth,
Amiddleward the weary winter night,
Visions of sun and sheen and summer-mirth
Dreamt out aloud unto the lightening sky,
What time the world, ere yet the day wax white,
Dreams that she dreams and knows the waking nigh.
3. TULIPS.
THE tulips are abroad beneath the sun.Like to a company of topers, fain,
After long drouth, the goblet full to drain,
O'er the brown earth, a-smile for winter done,
With lips uplifted to the light, they run,
Such draughts in-drinking of the golden rain,
Before the blithe day pass and summer wane,
There scarce would seem enough for every one.
What can be goodlier, tulips, or more sweet
Than this your life, that, for a blooming-while,
Flower out and flourish in the full sun's smile,
Then, Summer over, to your bulbs retreat
And snugly there the Winter sleep away
Nor wake to blossom till another May?
| Vigil and vision | |