From: Words on the window-pane
by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Spring
SOFT-LITTERED is the new-year's lambing-fold
And in the hollowed haystack at its side
The shepherd lies o'nights now, wakeful-eyed
At the ewes' travailing call through dark and cold
The young rooks cheep 'mid the thick caw o'the old:
And near unpeopled stream-sides, on the ground,
By her spring-cry the moorhen's nest is found,
Where the drained flood-lands flaunt their marigold.
Chill are the gusts to which the pastures cower,
And chill the current where the young reeds stand
As green and close as the young wheat on land:
Yet there the cuckoo and the cuckoo-flower
Plight to the heart Spring's perfect imminent hour
Whose breath shall soothe you like your dear one's hand.
@Father Steve, I wish I understood the second line of your poem and simnell is a sort of fruitbread special for Easter?
