All faintly through my soul to-day, As from a bell that far away Is tinkled by some frolic fay, Floateth a lovely chiming. Thou magic bell, to many a fell And many a winter-saddened dell Thy tongue a tale of Spring doth tell, Too passionate-sweet for rhyming.
Chime out, thou little song of Spring, Float in the blue skies ravishing. Thy song-of-life a joy doth bring That's sweet, albeit fleeting. Float on the Spring-winds e'en to my home: And when thou to a rose shalt come That hath begun to show her bloom, Say, I send her greeting!
◆
Comments
Loading comments…
📖 About this poem
This little poem is really a message tucked inside a melody. Lanier, working from Herder's German, imagines a bell-like song drifting through his soul, carrying the first sweet news that winter is loosening its grip. That opening image, a bell "tinkled by some frolic fay," gives the whole piece its light, chiming sound, and Lanier's ear for music (he was a poet and a working musician) shows in how the lines seem to ring rather than simply state. The poem never lingers on argument or complexity; it just asks this small song to float outward, over winter-worn valleys, into the blue sky, and finally home to a particular rose "that hath begun to show her bloom." That final hush, a private greeting smuggled inside a public song of spring, is what makes it endure. It's a small, sincere gesture: using the season's return to say, simply, I'm thinking of you.
Comments