All the radiance, the glamour,
The expectancy and poise,
Of this ancient life renewing
Its temerities and joys.

Soon the immemorial magic
Of the young Aprilian moon,
And the wonder of thy friendship
In the twilight — soon, ah, soon!

Bliss Carman

DIFFUGERE NIVES

DIFFUGERE nives, redeunt iam gramina

campis

Arboribusque comae;

Mutat terra vices et decrescentia ripas

Flumina praetereunt;

Gratia cum Nymphis geminisque sororibus audet
Ducere nuda choros.

Immortalia ne speres, monet annus et almum
Quae rapit hora diem.

Frigora mitescunt Zephyris, ver proterit aestas,
Interitura simul

Pomifer autumnus fruges effuderit, et mox
Bruma recurrit iners.

Damna tamen celeres reparant caelestia lunae:
Nos, ubi decidimus,

Quo pius Aeneas, quo Tullus dives et Ancus,
Pulvis et umbra sumus.

Quis scit an adiciant hodiernae crastina summae
Tempora di superi?

Cuncta manus avidas fugient heredis, amico

Quae dederis animo.

Cum semel occideris et de te splendida Minos
Fecerit arbitria,

Non, Torquate, genus, non te facundia, non te
Restituet pietas:

Infernis neque enim tenebris Diana pudicum
Liberat Hippolytum,

Nec Lethaea valet Theseus abrumpere caro

Vincula Pirithoo.

Horace

VENUS GENETRIX

AENEADUM genetrix, hominum divomque

voluptas,

Alma Venus, caeli subter labentia signa

Quae mare navigerum, quae terras frugiferentis Concelebras, per te quoniam genus omne animan

tum

Concipitur visitque exortum lumina solis:
Te, dea, te fugiunt venti, te nubila caeli
Adventumque tuum, tibi suavis daedala tellus
Summittit flores, tibi rident aequora ponti
Placatumque nitet diffuso lumine caelum.

Lucretius

THE HOUNDS OF SPRING

HEN the hounds of spring are on winter's

W traces,

The mother of months in meadow or plain Fills the shadows and windy places

With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain;

And the brown bright nightingale amorous

Is half assuaged for Itylus,

For the Thracian ships and the foreign faces, The tongueless vigil, and all the pain.

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

F

HIRTENLIED

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

Es 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

SPRIN

SPRING

PRING, the sweet Spring, is the year's pleasant 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