May 5, 2007

April Showers... (Part I)


Sweet April showers
Do spring May flowers
~Thomas Tusser


When Clouds appear like Rocks and Towers,
The Earth's refreshed by frequent Showers.
~John Claridge


O rain! with your dull two-fold sound,
The clash hard by, and the murmur all around!
~Samuel Taylor Coleridge



Winter is many months of the year
But now at last Maytime is here;
And birds sing from a leafy screen
In the trees and hedgerow freshly green;
And the wood-anemone is out in the shade,
With its blushing petals which too soon fade;
Once more the bracken is unfurling there,
And bluebells gently perfume the damp air.
~Veronica Ann Twells, Maytime


A delicate fabric of bird song
Floats in the air,
The smell of wet wild earth
Is everywhere.
Oh I must pass nothing by
Without loving it much,
The raindrop try with my lips,
The grass with my touch;
For how can I be sure
I shall see again
The world on the first of May
Shining after the rain?
- Sara Teasdale, May Day



Poetry is the silence and speech between a wet struggling
root of a flower and a sunlit blossom of that flower.
~Carl Sandburg

4 comments:

  1. I love pasque flowers! Yours are beautiful.

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  2. What is that flower? Very pretty, very delicate. Awfully nice quotes. I think I remember reading that Sara T. had a sad life, yet she wrote such pleasant pieces. I used the Tusser one on my blog one day, and was so amazed it was written such a long time ago. My guess is that his is the origin of the expression. What do you think?

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  3. Anonymous7:11 PM

    Yay for flowers. All of our flowers didn't make it through the random April freeze we had. I need to get out and plant some more!

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  4. Booklogged - Thanks! And thanks for the horticulture lesson. I didn't know they were called pasque flowers.

    Nan - It's an anemone/pasque flower. Isn't it lovely? Yes, I think Tusser's quote is the origin of the expression, near as I can tell from searching the Internet.

    Kristen - I'm glad I didn't plant any annuals before that freeze. I'm still hoping my shrub roses bounce back!

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