Here morning in the ploughman's songs is met Ere yet one footstep shows in all the sky, And twilight in the east, a doubt as yet, Shows not her sleeve of grey to know her bye. Woke early, I arose and thought that first In winter time of all the world was I. The old owls might have hallooed if they durst, But joy just then was up and whistled bye A merry tune which I had known full long, But could not to my memory wake it back, Until the ploughman changed it to the song. O happiness, how simple is thy track. --Tinged like the willow shoots, the east's young brow Glows red and finds thee singing at the plough. _Spring's Messengers_ Where slanting banks are always with the sun The daisy is in blossom even now; And where warm patches by the hedges run The cottager when coming home from plough Brings home a cowslip root in flower to set. Thus ere the Christmas goes the spring is met Setting up little tents about the fields In sheltered spots.--Primroses when they get Behind the wood's old roots, where ivy shields Their crimpled, curdled leaves, will shine and hide. Cart ruts and horses' footings scarcely yield A slur for boys, just crizzled and that's all. Frost shoots his needles by the small dyke side, And snow in scarce a feather's seen to fall. _Letter in Verse_ Like boys that run behind the loaded wain For the mere joy of riding back again, When summer from the meadow carts the hay And school hours leave them half a day to play; So I with leisure on three sides a sheet Of foolscap dance with poesy's measured feet, Just to ride post upon the wings of time And kill a care, to friendship turned in rhyme. The muse's gallop hurries me in sport With much to read and little to divert, And I, amused, with less of wit than will, Run till I tire.--And so to cheat her still. Like children running races who shall be First in to touch the orchard wall or tree, The last half way behind, by distance vext, Turns short, determined to be first the next; So now the muse has run me hard and long-- I'll leave at once her races and her song; And, turning round, laugh at the letter's close And beat her out by ending it in prose. _Snow Storm_ What a night! The wind howls, hisses, and but stops To howl more loud, while the snow volley keeps Incessant batter at the window pane, Making our comfort feel as sweet again; And in the morning, when the tempest drops, At every cottage door mountainous heaps Of snow lie drifted, that all entrance stops Untill the beesom and the shovel gain The path, and leave a wall on either side. The shepherd rambling valleys white and wide With new sensations his old memory fills, When hedges left at night, no more descried, Are turned to one white sweep of curving hills, And trees turned bushes half their bodies hide.