Spring / Theo Marzials

Spring

I stand as on the verge of life; 'tis Spring,
     When springs are welling ere they brim away;
When waking birds just cheep and shake their wing,
     And clouds come winding in the virgin day.
I look through fruit-boughs fresh with sprout and spray,
     Down loam-hills loosed by shoots where thick dews cling,
From out the deep sky night yet dreams away,
     Down lush marsh woods and waters wandering.
I stand between the past and the pursuing,
     Between the dream'd of deed and the undone,
With all the earth on tiptoe for the doing,
     And breathless for the start-word of the sun;
And dreaming drifts away and big with song
     My full heart fails when it should be most strong.

~~
Theo Marzials (1850-1920)
from The Gallery of Pigeons, and other poems, 1873

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada, the United States, and the European Union]

Theo Marzials biography