Come with bows bent and with emptying of quivers,

Maiden most perfect, lady of light,

With a noise of winds and many rivers
With a clamor of waters, and with might;
Bind on thy sandals, O thou most fleet,
Over the splendor and speed of thy feet;

For the faint east quickens, the wan west shivers, Round the feet of the day and the feet of the night.

Where shall we find her, how shall we sing to her,
Fold our hands round her knees, and cling?
O that man's heart were as fire and could spring
to her,

Fire, or the strength of the streams that spring!

For the stars and the winds are unto her

As raiment, as songs of the harp-player;

For the risen stars and the fallen cling to her, And the southwest-wind and the west-wind sing.

For winter's rains and ruins are over,
And all the season of snows and sins;
The days dividing lover and lover,

The light that loses, the night that wins;
And time remembered is grief forgotten,
And frosts are slain and flowers begotten,
And in green underwood and cover

Blossom by blossom the spring begins.

The full streams feed on flower of rushes,
Ripe grasses trammel a travelling foot,
The maiden flame of the young year flushes
From leaf to flower and flower to fruit;

And fruit and leaf are as gold and fire,
And the oat is heard above the lyre,
And the hoofèd heel of a satyr crushes
The chestnut-husk at the chestnut-root.

And Pan by noon and Bacchus by night,
Fleeter of foot than the fleet-foot kid,
Follows with dancing and fills with delight
The Maenad and the Bassarid;

And soft as lips that laugh and hide
The laughing leaves of the trees divide,
And screen from seeing and leave in sight
The god pursuing, the maiden hid.

The ivy falls with the Bacchanal's hair,
Over her eyebrows hiding her eyes;
The wild vine slipping down leaves bare
Her bright breast shortening into sighs;
The wild vine slips with the weight of its leaves,
But the berried ivy catches and cleaves
To the limbs that glitter, the feet that scare
The wolf that follows, the fawn that flies.

Algernon Charles Swinburne

HIRTENLIED

RAU HOLDA kam aus dem Berg hervor,
Zu ziehen durch Fluren und Auen.

FR

Gar süssen Klang vernahm da mein Ohr,
Mein Auge begehrte zu schauen:
:-
Da träumt' ich manchen .holden Traum,
Und als mein Aug' erschlossen kaum,
Da strahlten warm die Sonnen:
Der Mai, der Mai war kommen.
Nun spiel' ich lustig die Schalmei:
Der Mai ist da, der liebe Mai!

Richard Wagner

FRÜHLINGSGRUSS

S steht ein Berg im Feuer,
In feurigem Morgenbrand,
Und auf des Berges Spitze
Ein Tannbaum überm Land.

Und auf dem höchsten Wipfel
Steh' ich und schau' vom Baum;
O Welt, du schöne Welt du,
Man sieht dich vor Blüten kaum!

Joseph von Eichendorff

SPRING

SPRING, the sweet Spring, is the year's pleas

ant king;

Then blooms each thing, then maids dance in a ring,

Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do sing Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo!

The palm and may make country houses gay, Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day, And we hear aye birds tune this merry lay

Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo!

The fields breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet,
Young lovers meet, old wives a-sunning sit,
In every street these tunes our ears do greet -
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo!
Spring, the sweet Spring!

Thomas Nash

TH

THE BELLS OF YOUTH

HE Bells of Youth are ringing in the gateways of the South:

The bannerets of green are now unfurled: Spring has risen with a laugh, a wild-rose in her mouth,

And is singing, singing, singing thro' the world.

The Bells of Youth are ringing in all the silent places,

The primrose and the celandine are out:

Children run a-laughing with joy upon their faces,

The west wind follows after with a shout.

The Bells of Youth are ringing from the forests to the mountains,

From the meadows to the moorlands, hark their ringing!

Ten thousand thousand splashing rills and ferndappled fountains

Are flinging wide the Song of Youth and onward flowing, singing!

The Bells of Youth are ringing in the gate-ways of the South:

The bannerets of green are now unfurled: Spring has risen with a laugh, a wild-rose in her

mouth,

And is singing, singing, singing thro' the

world.

Fiona Macleod

LINES WRITTEN IN EARLY SPRING

I

HEARD a thousand blended notes,

While in a grove I sate reclined,

In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

To her fair works did Nature link

The human soul that through me ran; And much it grieved my heart to think What man has made of man.

Through primrose tufts, in that green bower,
The periwinkle trailed its wreaths;
And 'tis my faith that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.

The birds around me hopped and played,
Their thoughts I cannot measure: -
But the least motion which they made
It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

The budding twigs spread out their fan,
To catch the breezy air;

And I must think, do all I can,
That there was pleasure there.

If this belief from heaven be sent,
If such be Nature's holy plan,
Have I not reason to lament
What man has made of man?

William Wordsworth