SPRING-TIME by PUBLIUS OVIDIUS NASO

FOR once the zephyrs have removed the cold:
One year is over, and a new begun.
So short a winter, I am daily told,
Never yet yielded to this northern sun.
I see the children skipping o'er the green,
Plucking the faint unodorous violet,
A gentle stranger, rarely ever seen.
With other flowers the mead is sparsely set --
Brown birds are twittering with the joy of spring:
The universal swallow, ne'er at rest,
Aye chirping, glances past on purple wing,
And builds beneath the humble eaves her nest.
The plant, which yester-year the share o'erthrew,
Looks up again from out the opening mould;
And the poor vines, though here but weak and few,
Some scantling buds, like ill-set gems, unfold.

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