A Touch Of Nature

When first the crocus thrusts its point of gold
Up through the still snow-drifted garden mould,
And folded green things in dim woods unclose
Their crinkled spears, a sudden tremor goes
Into my veins and makes me kith and kin
To every wild-born thing that thrills and blows.
Sitting beside this crumbling sea-coal fire,
Here in the city's ceaseless roar and din,
Far from the brambly paths I used to know,
Far from the rustling brooks that slip and shine
Where the Neponset alders take their glow,
I share the tremulous sense of bud and briar
And inarticulate ardors of the vine.

Thomas Bailey Aldrich

Thomas Bailey Aldrich was an American writer, poet, critic, and editor. He is notable for his long editorship of The Atlantic Monthly. Born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, much of his writing was inspired by his experiences in the city. He wrote volumes of poetry, novels, and short stories. Aldrich's semi-autobiographical book, "The Story of a Bad Boy," is considered an early example of the "bad boy" genre in American literature.

Thomas Bailey Aldrich

I Vex Me Not With Brooding On The Years

Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Simple Poetry

Pauline Pavlovna

Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Simple Poetry

Palinode

Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Simple Poetry

A Mood

Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Simple Poetry

English

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At The Funeral Of A Minor Poet

[One of the Bearers soliloquizes:]

. . . Room in your heart for him, O Mother Earth,
Who loved each flower and leaf that made you fair,
And sang your praise in verses manifold
And delicate, with here and there a line
From end to end in blossom like a bough
The May breathes on, so rich it was.    Some thought
The workmanship more costly than the thing
Moulded or carved, as in those ornaments
Found at Mycaene.    And yet Nature's self
Works in this wise; upon a blade of grass,
Or what small note she lends the woodland thrush,
Lavishing endless patience.    He was born
Artist, not artisan, which some few saw
And many dreamed not.    As he wrote no odes
When Croesus wedded or Maecenas died,
And gave no breath to civic feasts and shows,
He missed the gla...

Thomas Bailey Aldrich

Spring Has Come

Intra Muros

The sunbeams, lost for half a year,
Slant through my pane their morning rays;
For dry northwesters cold and clear,
The east blows in its thin blue haze.

And first the snowdrop's bells are seen,
Then close against the sheltering wall
The tulip's horn of dusky green,
The peony's dark unfolding ball.

The golden-chaliced crocus burns;
The long narcissus-blades appear;
The cone-beaked hyacinth returns
To light her blue-flamed chandelier.

The willow's whistling lashes, wrung
By the wild winds of gusty March,
With sallow leaflets lightly strung,
Are swaying by the tufted larch.

The elms have robed their slender spray
With full-blown flower and embryo leaf;
Wide o'er the clasping arch of day
Soars like a cl...

Oliver Wendell Holmes

The Crocuses.

They heard the South wind sighing
    A murmur of the rain;
And they knew that Earth was longing
    To see them all again.

While the snow-drops still were sleeping
    Beneath the silent sod;
They felt their new life pulsing
    Within the dark, cold clod.

Not a daffodil nor daisy
    Had dared to raise its head;
Not a fairhaired dandelion
    Peeped timid from its bed;


Though a tremor of the winter
    Did shivering through them run;
Yet they lifted up their foreheads
    To greet the vernal sun.

And the sunbeams gave them welcome.
    As did the morning air
And scattered o'er their simple robes
    Rich tints of beauty rare.

Soon a host of lovely flowers
    From vales and woodland burst;
But...

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

Early Spring

I.

Once more the Heavenly Power
Makes all things new,
And domes the red-plowd hills
With loving blue;
The blackbirds have their wills,
The throstles too.



II.

Opens a door in heaven;
From skies of glass
A Jacobs ladder falls
On greening grass,
And oer the mountain-walls
Young angels pass.



III.

Before them fleets the shower,
And burst the buds,
And shine the level lands,
And flash the floods;
The stars are from their hands
Flung thro the woods,



IV.

The woods with living airs
How softly fannd,
Light airs from where the deep,
All down the sand,
Is breathing in his sleep,
Heard by the land.



V.

O,...

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Beech Blooms.

The wild oxalis
Among the valleys
Lifts up its chalice
Of pink and pearl;
And, balsam-breathing,
From out their sheathing,
The myriad wreathing
Green leaves uncurl.

The whole world brightens
With spring, that lightens
The foot that frightens
The building thrush;
Where water tosses
On ferns and mosses
The squirrel crosses
The beechen hush.

And vision on vision,
Like ships elysian
On some white mission,
Sails cloud on cloud;
With scents of clover
The winds brim over,
And in the cover
The stream is loud.

'Twixt bloom that blanches
The orchard branches
Old farms and ranches
Gleam in the gloam;
'Mid blossoms blowing,
Through fields for sowing,
The cows come lowing,
The cows...

Madison Julius Cawein

When Trees Are Green.

    Would you be glad of heart and good?
    Would you forget life's toil and care?
    Come, lose yourself in this old wood
    When May's soft touch is everywhere.

    The hawthorn trees are white as snow,
    The basswood flaunts its feathery sprays,
    The willows kiss the stream below
    And listen to its flatteries:

    "O willows supple, yellow, green,
    Long have I flowed o'er stock and stone,
    I say with truth I have not seen
    A rarer beauty than your own!"

    The rough-bark hickory, elm, and beech
    With quick'ning thrill and growth are rife;
    Oak, maple, through the heart of each
    There runs a glorious tide of life.

    Fresh leaves, young buds on every hand,
    On trunk and limb a hint of red,
 ...

Jean Blewett