THE MIRACLE

Come, sweetheart, listen, for I have a thing

Most wonderful to tell you — news of spring.

Albeit winter still is in the air,

And the earth troubled, and the branches bare,

Yet down the fields to-day I saw her pass —

The spring — her feet went shining through the grass.

She touched the ragged hedgerows — I have seen

Her finger-prints, most delicately green;

And she has whispered to the crocus leaves,

And to the garrulous sparrows in the eaves.

Swiftly she passed and shyly, and her fair

Young face was hidden in her cloudy hair.

She would not stay, her season is not yet,

But she has reawakened, and has set

The sap of all the world astir, and rent

Once more the shadows of our discontent.

Triumphant news — a miracle I sing —

The everlasting miracle of spring.