The Criterion/Volume 4/Number 3/Spring Ode

by Frank Stuart Flint

SPRING ODE

By F. S. FLINT

I
WHITE on its branches
And again!
The spring has brought
The double-flowering cherry
To its beauty;
And you too with the spring
Have blossomed:
And both are fruitless.

II
Along the river tracks
Have rearisen
The daffodils and white narcissi
With the golden eyes
Of pheasants;
Ancf shall we too, like them,
Wither
Down to the grass,
And, unlike them,
Be absent
When the spring calls
In the year to come?

III
You can find me in the clouds,
In the hills, in the winds, in the waters;
You can see me in the flowers,
And hear me in the songs of birds.
Wherever there is beauty is your delight,
And there am I for you and with you.
Is there then any need of me,
Of my tired and twisted face,
Is my body or my mind
Of use to you?
When you can love me without them,—
Not me
But the notion of me?
When with this you can go your ways,
Happy that all beautiful things
Mean your love
And your love means all these?