Irish Jesuit Province

Snow in MayAuthor(s): Eugene DavisSource: The Irish Monthly, Vol. 14, No. 156 (Jun., 1886), p. 329Published by: Irish Jesuit ProvinceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20497422 .

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329 )

SNOW IN MAY.

W HERE be all the poet's visions of a summer's peerless glow? May hath come-the minx I-but brought us leaden clouds and wreaths

of snow !

Stepping from the Dents dui midi' to the infant vines below, She hath sptead Death's winding mantle o'er the valleys of the Vaud.

While I gaze upon the snow-flakes wafted hither from Tyrol, Strangest thoughts steal on my fancy-stranger feelings thrill my soul;

For to me these white-robed foundlings seem sweet messengers of love MIystic flowers dropped by angels from the azure fields above !

Flowers of another springtide, far beyond earth's prison-bars, Garnered on the breast of planets 'mid the glory of the stars!

Yet the full-leaved trees look gruesome in their weird Siberian pall, Like the spectres seen at midnight, in some lone ancestral hall;

But the summer zephyr cometh, sly and furtive, from the hills Breathing balm upon the vineyards, and a blessing on the rills;

Then he rushes, clad in anger, o'er the plaintive dells and leas Sweeping icicles and snow-flakes from the branches of the tiees.

Loudly laugh the stately lindens in a "gaudeanus! " meet, As they see the white wreaths falling on the heather at their feet!1

And they seem to thank the zephyr-rustling gaily to and fro, Chaunting: "1 Praises to the west wind-he hath saved us from the snow!"

Where be all the poet's visions, like his dreams long, long ago ? Ah, for him they're wrapped and buried in bleak cerements of snow !

Yet, methinks, although his future -lit with dim despairing gleams-_ May be peopled with chimeras grim as satyrs seen in dreams.

Summer waits him on the threshold, ready with Life's counterpart, Sweeping care and melancholy from the deserts of his heart I

Then he scales the heights Olympian-he hath reached the destined goal, While a Maytide's " gaudeamus ! " wakes the echoes of his soul!

Wherefore be it that these snow-wreaths, flitting, floating spirit-wise, May be bouquets sent to greet him from the springtide in the skies !

EuGsinE D&vis

* A range of mountains overlooking lake Leman.

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