Owed to Spring

When men most try to harness love
Is when it easiest escapes.
It is a gift from one who has enough,
To those who do not take.

Though into how a change of season
Caused me to embrace this reason

I
Can only pry,

Still, I know that summer—
Not in trust
But with brandishings—
Will fry last Autumn's boast: it must.

Thus, beneath its thumb, it mashes me.

But I have not allowed the winter's cold to hurt too dear,
For I remembered, if it weren't for vice and virtue here,
Ashes would not ashes be, and—if I must, I must—
Were life not nearly half as good, dust would not be dust.

So, welcome, sanity,
But look askance
At youthful vanity
Turned arrogance,

While I strum and sing spring's song eternal underneath her laden bower
And dance my precious soul's most celebrated dance for yet another hour.


by Robert Hampton Burt

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