For the Year is sempiternal,
Never wintry, never vernal,
Still the same through all the changes
That our wondering eyes behold. 
Spring is but his time of wooing—­
Summer but the sweet renewing
Of the vows he utters yearly,
Ever fondly and sincerely,
To the young bride that he weddeth,
When to heaven departs the old,
For it is her fate to perish,
Having brought him,
In the Autumn,
Children for his heart to cherish. 
Summer, like a human mother,
Dies in bringing forth her young;
Sorrow blinds him,
Winter finds him
Childless, too, their graves among,
Till May returns once more, and the bridal hymns are sung.

Thrice the great Betroth’ed naming,
Thrice the mystic banns proclaiming,
February, March, and April,
Spread the tidings far and wide;
Thrice they questioned each new-comer,
“Know ye, why the sweet-faced Summer,
With her rich imperial dower,
Golden fruit and diamond flower,
And her pearly raindrop trinkets,
Should not be the green Earth’s Bride?”
All things vocal spoke elated
(Nor the voiceless
Did rejoice less)—­
“Be the heavenly lovers mated!”
All the many murmuring voices
Of the music-breathing Spring,
Young birds twittering,
Streamlets glittering,
Insects on transparent wing—­
All hailed the Summer nuptials of their King!

Now the rosy East gives warning,
’Tis the wished-for nuptial morning. 
Sweetest truant from Elysium,
Golden morning of the May! 
All the guests are in their places—­
Lilies with pale, high-bred faces—­
Hawthorns in white wedding favours,
Scented with celestial savours—­
Daisies, like sweet country maidens,
Wear white scolloped frills to-day;
’Neath her hat of straw the Peasant
Primrose sitteth,
Nor permitteth
Any of her kindred present,
Specially the milk-sweet cowslip,
E’er to leave the tranquil shade;
By the hedges,
Or the edges
Of some stream or grassy glade,
They look upon the scene half wistful, half afraid.

Other guests, too, are invited,
From the alleys dimly lighted,
From the pestilential vapours
Of the over-peopled town—­
From the fever and the panic,
Comes the hard-worked, swarth mechanic—­
Comes the young wife pallor-stricken
At the cares that round her thicken—­
Comes the boy whose brow is wrinkled,
Ere his chin is clothed in down—­
And the foolish pleasure-seekers,
Nightly thinking
They are drinking
Life and joy from poisoned beakers,
Shudder at their midnight madness,
And the raving revel scorn: 
All are treading
To the wedding
In the freshness of the morn,
And feel, perchance too late, the bliss of being born.