<h3><SPAN name="SPRING_SONG" name="SPRING_SONG"></SPAN>SPRING SONG.</h3>
<p>Make me over, mother April,
<br/>When the sap begins to stir!
<br/>When thy flowery hand delivers
<br/>All the mountain-prisoned rivers,
<br/>And thy great heart beats and quivers,
<br/>To revive the days that were,
<br/>Make me over, mother April,
<br/>When the sap begins to stir!
<br/>
<br/>Take my dust and all my dreaming,
<br/>Count my heart-beats one by one,
<br/>Send them where the winters perish;
<br/>Then some golden noon recherish
<br/>And restore them in the sun,
<br/>Flower and scent and dust and dreaming,
<br/>With their heart-beats every one!
<br/>
<br/>Set me in the urge and tide-drift
<br/>Of the streaming hosts a-wing!
<br/>Breast of scarlet, throat of yellow,
<br/>Raucous challenge, wooings mellow—
<br/>Every migrant is my fellow,
<br/>Making northward with the spring.
<br/>Loose me in the urge and tide-drift
<br/>Of the streaming hosts a-wing!
<br/>
<br/>Shrilling pipe or fluting whistle,
<br/>In the valleys come again;
<br/>Fife of frog and call of tree-toad,
<br/>All my brothers, five or three-toed,
<br/>With their revel no more vetoed,
<br/>Making music in the rain;
<br/>Shrilling pipe or fluting whistle,
<br/>In the valleys come again.
<br/>
<br/>Make me of thy seed to-morrow,
<br/>When the sap begins to stir!
<br/>Tawny light-foot, sleepy bruin,
<br/>Bright-eyes in the orchard ruin,
<br/>Gnarl the good life goes askew in,
<br/>Whiskey-jack, or tanager,—
<br/>Make me anything to-morrow,
<br/>When the sap begins to stir!
<br/>
<br/>Make me even (How do I know?)
<br/>Like my friend the gargoyle there;
<br/>It may be the heart within him
<br/>Swells that doltish hands should pin him
<br/>Fixed forever in mid-air.
<br/>Make me even sport for swallows,
<br/>Like the soaring gargoyle there!
<br/>
<br/>Give me the old clue to follow,
<br/>Through the labyrinth of night!
<br/>Clod of clay with heart of fire,
<br/>Things that burrow and aspire,
<br/>With the vanishing desire,
<br/>For the perishing delight,—
<br/>Only the old clue to follow,
<br/>Through the labyrinth of night!
<br/>
<br/>Make me over, mother April,
<br/>When the sap begins to stir!
<br/>Fashion me from swamp or meadow,
<br/>Garden plot or ferny shadow,
<br/>Hyacinth or humble burr!
<br/>Make me over, mother April,
<br/>When the sap begins to stir!
<br/>
<br/>Let me hear the far, low summons,
<br/>When the silver winds return;
<br/>Rills that run and streams that stammer,
<br/>Goldenwing with his loud hammer,
<br/>Icy brooks that brawl and clamor,
<br/>Where the Indian willows burn;
<br/>Let me hearken to the calling,
<br/>When the silver winds return,
<br/>
<br/>Till recurring and recurring,
<br/>Long since wandered and come back,
<br/>Like a whim of Grieg's or Gounod's,
<br/>This same self, bird, bud, or Bluenose,
<br/>Some day I may capture (Who knows?)
<br/>Just the one last joy I lack,
<br/>Waking to the far new summons,
<br/>When the old spring winds come back.
<br/>
<br/>For I have no choice of being,
<br/>When the sap begins to climb,—
<br/>Strong insistence, sweet intrusion,
<br/>Vasts and verges of illusion,—
<br/>So I win, to time's confusion,
<br/>The one perfect pearl of time,
<br/>Joy and joy and joy forever,
<br/>Till the sap forgets to climb!
<br/>
<br/>Make me over in the morning
<br/>From the rag-bag of the world!
<br/>Scraps of dream and duds of daring,
<br/>Home-brought stuff from far sea-faring,
<br/>Faded colors once so flaring,
<br/>Shreds of banners long since furled!
<br/>Hues of ash and glints of glory,
<br/>In the rag-bag of the world!
<br/>
<br/>Let me taste the old immortal
<br/>Indolence of life once more;
<br/>Not recalling nor foreseeing,
<br/>Let the great slow joys of being
<br/>Well my heart through as of yore!
<br/>Let me taste the old immortal
<br/>Indolence of life once more!
<br/>
<br/>Give me the old drink for rapture,
<br/>The delirium to drain,
<br/>All my fellows drank in plenty
<br/>At the Three Score Inns and Twenty
<br/>From the mountains to the main!
<br/>Give me the old drink for rapture,
<br/>The delirium to drain!
<br/>
<br/>Only make me over, April,
<br/>When the sap begins to stir!
<br/>Make me man or make me woman,
<br/>Make me oaf or ape or human,
<br/>Cup of flower or cone of fir;
<br/>Make me anything but neuter
<br/>When the sap begins to stir!</p>
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