The Return Of Spring

by Bayard Taylor

Have I passed through Death's unconscious birth,
In a dream the midnight bare?
I look on another and fairer Earth:
I breathe a wondrous air!

A spirit of beauty walks the hills,
A spirit of love the plain;
The shadows are bright, and the sunshine fills
The air with a diamond rain!

Before my vision the glories swim,
To the dance of a tune unheard:
Is an angel singing where woods are dim,
Or is it an amorous bird?

Is it a spike of azure flowers,
Deep in the meadows seen,
Or is it the peacock's neck, that towers
Out of the spangled green?

Is a white dove glancing across the blue,
Or an opal taking wing?
For my soul is dazzled through and through,
With the splendor of the Spring.

Is it she that shines, as never before,
The tremulous hills above, --
Or the heart within me, awake once more
To the dawning light of love?