XXXVII

SPRING

WHEN daisies pied and violets blue

And lady-smocks all silver-white

And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue

Do paint the meadows with delight,
The cuckoo then, on every tree,

Mocks married men; for thus sings he,
Cuckoo ;

Cuckoo, cuckoo :-O word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear!

When shepherds pipe on oaten straws

And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks, When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws, And maidens bleach their summer smocks,

The cuckoo then, on every tree,

Mocks married men; for thus sings he,

Cuckoo ;

Cuckoo, cuckoo :-O word of fear,

Unpleasing to a married ear!

XXXVIII

WINTER

WHEN icicles hang by the wall

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail

And Tom bears logs into the hall

And milk comes frozen home in pail,
When blood is nipp'd and ways be foul,

Then nightly sings the staring owl,
Tu-whit ;

Tu-who-a merry note ;

While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

When all aloud the wind doth blow

And coughing drowns the parson's saw

And birds sit brooding in the snow

And Marian's nose looks red and raw,

When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,

Then nightly sings the staring owl,
Tu-whit ;

Tu-who;-a merry note ;

While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

XXXIX

VENERI VICTRICI

LOVE, Love, nothing but Love, still more! For, O, love's bow

Shoots buck and doe:

The shaft confounds,

Not that it wounds,

But tickles still the sore.

These lovers cry Oh! oh! they die !

Yet that which seems the wound to kill,

Doth turn oh! oh! to ha! ha! he!

So dying love lives still :

Oh! oh! a while, but ha! ha! ha!

Oh! oh! groans out for ha! ha! ha!

--Heigh-ho!

XL

A SEA DIRGE

FULL fathom five thy father lies

Of his bones are coral made;

Those are pearls that were his eyes :
Nothing of him that doth fade

But doth suffer a sea-change

Into something rich and strange.

Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell :

Ding-dong.

;

Hark! now I hear them,-Ding-dong, bell.

White his shroud as the mountain snow,

Larded with sweet flowers ;

Which bewept to the grave did go

With true-love showers.