{april 19: in memoriam, year 26}

To Daffodils

Oakmont 4

By Robert Herrick 1591–1674

Fair Daffodils, we weep to see

         You haste away so soon;

As yet the early-rising sun

         Has not attain’d his noon.

                        Stay, stay,

                Until the hasting day

                        Has run

                But to the even-song;

And, having pray’d together, we

Will go with you along.

We have short time to stay, as you,

         We have as short a spring;

As quick a growth to meet decay,

         As you, or anything.

                        We die

                As your hours do, and dry

                        Away,

                Like to the summer’s rain;

Or as the pearls of morning’s dew,

Ne’er to be found again.

3 Replies to “{april 19: in memoriam, year 26}”

  1. I see your daffodils and raise them with cherry blossoms, “since to look at things is bloom / fifty springs are little room”

    A Shropshire Lad 2: Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
    BY A. E. HOUSMAN

    Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
    Is hung with bloom along the bough,
    And stands about the woodland ride
    Wearing white for Eastertide.

    Now, of my threescore years and ten,
    Twenty will not come again,
    And take from seventy springs a score,
    It only leaves me fifty more.

    And since to look at things in bloom
    Fifty springs are little room,
    About the woodlands I will go
    To see the cherry hung with snow.

  2. It’s a toss up as to whether sweet peas or daffodils are my favorite flowers. But if I have to die like nature, I’d prefer to be some kind of maple tree; not that it seems that I have any say in that.

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.