The Spring is come! the breath of May
Creeps whisperingly where brightest flowers have birth,
And the young sun peeps forth with redder ray
On the broad bosom of the teeming earth.
The Spring is come! how gladly nature wakes
From the dark slumber of the vanished year
How gladly every gushing streamlet breaks
The summer stillness with its music clear!

But thou art old, my heart! the breath of Spring
No longer swells thee with a rapturous glow
The wild bird carols blithely on the way,
But wakes no smile upon my withered brow.
Thou art grown old! no more the generous thought
Sends the warm blood more swiftly through the veins —
Selfish and cold thou shrinkest — Spring hath nought
For thee but memory of vanished pains.

The day-break brings no bounding from my rest,
Eagerly glad, and strong in soul and limb;
But through the weary lid (unwelcome guest!)
The sunlight struggles with a lustre dim.
The evening brings no calm — the night no sleep,
But feverish tossings on the hateful bed;
While the vexed thoughts their anxious vigils keep,
Yet more to weary out the aching head.

Still the deep grove — the bower — my footsteps seek:
Still do I read beneath the flowery thorn;
And with a worn and hollow-eaten cheek,
Woo the young freshness of the laughing morn.
But now no pleasure in the well-known lines
Expands my brow, or sparkles in mine eye;
O'er the dull page my languid head declines,
And wakes the echo with a listless sigh.

Ah! mocking wind, that wandereth o'er my form,
With freshened scents from every opening flower;
Deep — deep within the never-dying worm —
Life's longing's all unquenched, defy the power!
There coolness comes not with the cooling breeze —
There music flows not with the gushing rill —
There shadows calm not from the spreading trees —
Unslaked, the eternal fever burneth still!

Mock us not, Nature, with thy symbol vain
Of hope succeeding hope, through endless years —
Earth's buds may burst — earth's groves be green again,
But man — can man forget youth's bitter tears?
I thirst — I thirst! but duller day by day
Grow the clogg'd soarings of my spirit's wing;
Faintly the sap of life slow ebbs away,
And the worn heart denies a second Spring.