"Do you ask what the birds say?"

D

you ask what the birds say? The sparrow,

the dove,

The linnet and thrush say, "I love, and I love!"
In the winter they're silent, the wind is so

strong;

What it says I don't know, but it sings a loud song.
But green leaves and blossoms, and sunny warm weather,
And singing and loving-all come back together.
The lark is so brimful of gladness and love,

The green fields below him, the blue sky above,
That he sings, and he sings, and forever sings he,
"I love my Love, and my Love loves me".

Coleridge.

B

Wind-Song

LOW, blow, winds blow, braggart winds and

merry

Blow down the almond snow, toss the flowering cherry.

Daffodils ablow, arow, mingle in their dances; Shake the purple flags that grow tall amid their lances. Blow, O winds blow, strip the winter-berry!

Far and near, push and peer; here's a nest a-growing. Winds merry, winds dear, hush here your blowing! Trouble not the mother-wren when she comes and goes, Dreaming of the wings and songs that her secret knows. Soft here, winds dear, where the nests are showing.

Blow, blow loud and low, wild winds and merry; Hurtling down upon our heads, bring a snow of cherry.

Bring the yellow kingcups out in the flowerless places; Set the naked woods aflush with the wind-flowers' faces. Make the old briar run with sap ready for the berry; Bring the swallows April follows, wild winds and merry. Nora Chesson.

Wind of the West

BEAR the banner of the sun at noon;
I light the million jewelled lamps of June;
I weave, from sky and purple sea below,
The rosy cradle where a baby moon
Rocks in the afterglow.

Awake, ye bells, shine out, ye stars of spring;
And let the music of the wild wood ring;
Deck my dear harp anew with golden green—
My ancient, forest harp, whereon I sing
Of all this budding scene.

A

song

of rainbows gleaming on the rain:
Of sap and scent and sunlight come again;
Of the young laughing year's unmeasured mirth:
Of quickened Nature's mother-pang, whose pain
Forewent his vernal birth.

Joyful and sad, as plain-song from the pine,
Where wood-doves woo, melts liquid into thine,
Thou amber mavis with the raptured heart-
Even so this leaf-borne melody of mine

Shall play its peaceful part.

Eden Phillpotts.

(B 888)

1234

Good Counsel

T early dawn through London you must go
Until you come where long black hedgerows

grow,

With pink buds pearled, and here and there

a tree,

And gates and stiles; and watch good country folk;
And scent the spicy smoke

Of withered weeds that burn where gardens be;
And in a ditch perhaps a primrose see.

The rooks shall stalk the plough, larks mount the skies,
Blackbirds and speckled thrushes sing aloud,

Hid in the warm white cloud

Mantling the thorn, and far away shall rise
The milky low of cows and farmyard cries. >

John Davidson.

The Green Things

HE spring is over London

In park and street and square,
And grimy branches grope in bud
Athwart the burdened air.

And oh! the green things growing

'Neath skies that scowl them down,
The back-yard trees of London,
That starve in London town!

Poor exiles of the upland,
Lorn lovers of the grass,
Have ye no ruder blush to show
Now Spring has come to pass?

Ye orphan green things blooming
'Twixt walls of black and brown,

Is there no sun in London,

No wind in London town?

Mild martyrs of the city,
Apostles from the fields,
Ye bear the sweet evangel
The April woodland yields.

Dear heart! the green things striving
Their broken lives to crown

With tragic flowers of London,

Still-born in London town!

Perceval Gibbon.

To Blossoms

AIR pledges of a fruitful tree,

Why do

ye fall so fast?

Your date is not so past,

But you may stay yet here awhile
To blush and gently smile,
And go at last.

What, were ye born to be

An hour or half's delight,
And so to bid good-night?

'T was pity Nature brought ye forth
Merely to show your worth,
And lose you quite.

But you are lovely leaves, where we
May read how soon things have
Their end, though ne'er so brave:
And after they have shown their pride
Like you, awhile, they glide

Into the grave.

Herrick.

Summer Gloaming

T is a Summer's gloaming, faint and sweet,
A gloaming brightened by an infant moon
Fraught with the fairest light of middle June;
The garden path rings hard beneath my feet,
And hark, O hear I not the gentle dews
Fretting the gentle forest in his sleep?
Or does the stir of housing insects creep
Thus faintly on mine ear? day's many hues
Waned with the paling light and are no more,
And none but drowsy pinions beat the air—
The bat is circling softly by my door,

And silent as the snow-flake leaves his lair,
In the dark twilight flitting here and there
Wheeling the self-same circuit o'er and o'er.

C. Tennyson-Turner.

A

Dreaming Oaks

S when, upon a tranced summer night, Those green-robed senators of mighty woods, Tall oaks, branch-charm'd by the earnest stars, Dream, and so dream all night without a stir, Save from one gradual solitary gust Which comes upon the silence, and dies off, As if the ebbing air had but one wave.

Keats.