O skein of wild-geese, flying
Through April's starry blue,
Your harsh and eager crying
Searches through and through
My heart till it takes flight
Arrow-like with you
To pierce the Northern night,
Shedding flakes of light
From wings of flashing white
Through tingling airs aquiver
On tossing waves that shiver
Crystal berg and floe—
On crashing ghylls and forces of winter's melting snow.

When down the watercourses
The spate of April dins,
Like hoofs of countless horses
Thunder the threshing linns
As leaping 'twixt the scars
Bright froth spurts and spins
And sprays the leafing spars
Of woods that rake the stars;
And shattering bonds and bars
My spirit pours in thunder
Of torrents, trampling under
Dead winter's slothful dreams,
Till life's a singing tumult of April-wakened streams.