May

from THE SHEPHERD’S CALENDAR

Come, Queen of Months! in company
With all thy merry minstrelsy: –
The restless cuckoo, absent long,
And twittering swallows’ chimney-song;
With hedge-row crickets’ notes, that run
From every bank that fronts the sun;
And swarthy bees, about the grass,
That stop with every bloom they pass,
And every minute, every hour,
Keep teasing weeds that wear a flower;
And Toil, and Childhood’s humming joys!

For there is music in the noise
When village children, wild for sport,
In school-time’s leisure, ever short,
Alternate catch the bounding ball;
Or run along the church-yard wall,
Capp’ed with rude figured slabs, whose claims
In times’ bad memory have no names;
Or race around the nooky church;
Or raise loud echoes in the porch;
Throw pebbles o’er the weather-cock,
Viewing with jealous eyes the clock.

~ John Clare (1793-1864), English Romantic poet