Earliest Spring

Tossing his mane of snows in wildest eddies and
tangles,
Lion-like March cometh in, hoarse, with tempestuous
breath,
Through all the moaning chimneys, and 'thwart all the
hollows and angles
Round the shuddering house, threating of winter and
death.
But in my heart I feel the life of the wood and the meadow
Thrilling the pulses that own kindred with fibres that

lift
Bud and blade to the sunward, within the inscrutable
shadow,
Deep in the oak's chill core, under the gathering drift.
Nay, to earth's life in mine some prescience, or dream,
or desire
(How shall I name it aright?) comes for a moment and
goes —
Rapture of life ineffable, perfect — as if in the brier,
Leafless there by my door, trembled a sense of the rose.