Approach of Summer

When winter scourges earth with vicious flail

And nature cowers cringing ‘neath his lash,

When life is taken in the strangler’s grip

And beaten nigh to death with stinging hail;

When naked trees grotesque in lightning flash

Seem to presage last rites; then droops the lip,

Then is the time that human spirits quail,

Blood thinning and cheek paling.  Yet a flash

Of snowdrop white can make the heartbeats skip,

And pink tipp’d buds can end the winter’s tale.

Forward we look, though eyes be blurred with sleet,

And see the flowers of spring already blown.

High summer in our hearts ascends the throne

And days wing by that happy king to greet !

 

Weekly Times     13.5.60