Daughter of heaven and earth, coy Spring,
With sudden passion languishing,
Teaching barren moors to smile,
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Daughter of heaven and earth, coy Spring,
With sudden passion languishing,
Teaching barren moors to smile,
Painting pictures mile on mile,
Holds a cup of cowslip wreaths
Whence a smokeless incense breathes.

The spring's already at the gate
With looks my care beguiling;
The country round appeareth straight
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The spring's already at the gate
With looks my care beguiling;
The country round appeareth straight
A flower-garden smiling.

Lo! where the rosy bosom'd Hours
Fair Venus' train appear,
Disclose the long-expecting flowers,
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Lo! where the rosy bosom'd Hours
Fair Venus' train appear,
Disclose the long-expecting flowers,
And wake the purple year.

Now spring returns; but not to me returns
The vernal joy my better years have known;
Dim read more

Now spring returns; but not to me returns
The vernal joy my better years have known;
Dim in my breast life's dying taper burns,
And all the joys of life with health have flown.

They know who keep a broken tryst,
Till something from the Spring be missed
We have not read more

They know who keep a broken tryst,
Till something from the Spring be missed
We have not truly known the Spring.

Now Nature hangs her mantle green
On every blooming tree,
And spreads her sheets o' daisies white
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Now Nature hangs her mantle green
On every blooming tree,
And spreads her sheets o' daisies white
Out o'er the grassy lea.

Spring makes its own statement, so loud and clear that the gardener seems to be only one of the instruments, read more

Spring makes its own statement, so loud and clear that the gardener seems to be only one of the instruments, not the composer.

I have always tried to hide my efforts and wished my works to have a light joyousness of springtime which read more

I have always tried to hide my efforts and wished my works to have a light joyousness of springtime which never lets anyone suspect the labors it has cost me.

I come, I come! ye have called me long,
I come o'er the mountain with light and song:
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I come, I come! ye have called me long,
I come o'er the mountain with light and song:
Ye may trace my step o'er the wakening earth,
By the winds which tell of the violet's birth,
By the primrose-stars in the shadowy grass,
By the green leaves, opening as I pass.