Come up, April, through the valley,
  Where the fountain sleeps to-day,
Let him, freed from icy fetters,
  Go rejoicing on his way;
Through the flower-enameled meadows
  Let him run his laughing race,
Making love to all the blossoms
  That o’erlean and kiss his face.

But not birds and blossoms only,
  Not alone the streams complain,
Men and maidens too are calling,
  Come up, April, come again! 
Waiting with the sweet impatience
  Of a lover for the hours
They shall set the tender beauty
  Of thy feet among the flowers!

AUTUMN

Shorter and shorter now the twilight clips
  The days, as through the sunset gates they crowd,
And Summer from her golden collar slips
  And strays through stubble-fields and moans aloud.

Save when by fits the warmer air deceives,
  And, stealing hopeful to some sheltered bower,
She lies on pillows of the yellow leaves,
  And tries the old tunes over for an hour.

The wind, whose tender whisper in the May
  Set all the young blooms listening through the grove,
Sits rustling in the faded boughs to-day
  And makes his cold and unsuccessful love.

The rose has taken off her ’tire of red—­
  The mullein-stalk its yellow stars have lost,
And the proud meadow-pink hangs down her head
  Against earth’s chilly bosom, witched with frost.

The robin, that was busy all the June,
  Before the sun had kissed the topmost bough,
Catching our hearts up in his golden tune,
  Has given place to the brown cricket now.

The very cock crows lonesomely at morn—­
  Each flag and fern the shrinking stream divides—­
Uneasy cattle low, and lambs forlorn
  Creep to their strawy sheds with nettled sides.

Shut up the door:  who loves me must not look
  Upon the withered world, but haste to bring
His lighted candle, and his story-book,
  And live with me the poetry of spring.

* * * * *

POEMS BY CHARLES KINGSLEY

THE THREE FISHERS

Three fishers went sailing away to the west—­
  Away to the west as the sun went down;
Each thought on the woman who loved him the best,
  And the children stood watching them out of the town;
For men must work, and women must weep;
And there’s little to earn, and many to keep,
    Though the harbor bar be moaning.

Three wives sat up in the lighthouse tower,
  And they trimm’d the lamps as the sun went down;
They look’d at the squall, and they look’d at the shower,
  And the night-rack came rolling up, ragged and brown;
But men must work, and women must weep,
Though storms be sudden, and waters deep,
    And the harbor bar be moaning.