The Greek Spring

WHEN in the glad green tide the childish brooks
Born in the rainy mystery of nights
Slip through new fields, the gray-eyed acolytes
Of spring, the formal olives with prim looks,
Advance their festive dances in the nooks
Of mountains and the vales, while dressed in whites
With lovely fillets bound each orchard lights
The earth with gathering revel. Then to the crooks
Of shepherds bound new lamb and new-got kid
Which anxious dams survey. Small birds in air,
Like dolphins in bright seas, leap up amid
The flecked and glancing sunbeams everywhere.
The steepled sky, the pinnacles of cloud
Crown the blithe earth with chaplet high and proud.