Poems (Jackson)/In April

by Helen Hunt Jackson

For works with similar titles, see In April.

IN APRIL.

HAT did the sparrow do yesterday?
 Nobody knew but the sparrows;
He were too bold who should try to say;
They have forgotten it all to-day.
Why does it haunt my thoughts this way,
 With a joy that piques and harrows,
  As the birds fly past,
  And the chimes ring fast,
And the long spring shadows sweet shadow cast?

There 's a maple-bud redder to-day;
 It will almost flower to-morrow;
I could swear 't was only yesterday
In a sheath of snow and ice it lay,
With fierce winds blowing it every way;
 Whose surety had it to borrow,
  Till birds should fly past,
  And chimes ring fast,
And the long spring shadows sweet shadow cast?

"Was there ever a day like to-day,
 So clear, so shining, so tender?"
The old cry out; and the children say,
With a laugh, aside: "That's always the way
With the old, in spring; as long as they stay,
 They find in it greater splendor,
  When the birds fly past,
  And the chimes ring fast,
And the long spring shadows sweet shadow cast!"

Then that may be why my thoughts all day—
 I see I am old, by the token—
Are so haunted by sounds, now sad, now gay,
Of the words I hear the sparrows say,
And the maple-bud's mysterious way
 By which from its sheath it has broken,
  While the birds fly past,
  And the chimes ring fast,
And the long spring shadows sweet shadow cast!