We have short time to stay, as you; We have as short a spring, As quick a growth to meet decay, As you, or any thing: We die, As your hours doe; and drie Away Like to the summer's raine, Or as the pearles of morning dew, Ne'er to be found again. HERRICK 42 ODE ON SPRING. ODE ON SPRING. Lo! where the rosy-bosomed Hours, Fair Venus' train, appear, The untaught harmony of spring: Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch A broader, browner shade, Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech O'ercanopies the glade, Beside some water's rushy brink With me the Muse shall sit, and think (At ease reclined in rustic state) How vain the ardor of the crowd, How indigent the great! ODE ON SPRING. Still is the toiling hand of Care; The panting herds repose: Yet, hark, how through the peopled air The insect-youth are on the wing, To Contemplation's sober eye And they that creep, and they that fly, Alike the Busy and the Gay But flutter through life's little day, In Fortune's varying colors drest: Brushed by the hand of rough Mischance, Or chilled by Age, their airy dance They leave, in dust to rest. Methinks I hear, in accents low, The sportive kind reply : 43 |