The Saints' Maying

Since green earth is awake     Let us now pastime take,     Not serving wantonness     Too well, nor niggardness,     Which monks of men would make.     But clothed like earth in green,     With jocund hearts and clean,     We will take hands and go     Singing where quietly blow     The flowers of Spring's demesne.     The cuckoo haileth loud     The open sky; no cloud     Doth fleck the earth's blue tent;     The land laughs, well content     To put off winter shroud.     Now, since 'tis Easter Day,     All Christians may have play;     The young Saints, all agaze     For Christ in Heaven's maze,     May laugh who wont to pray.     Then welcome to our round     They light on homely ground:--     Agnes, Saint Cecily,     Agatha, Dorothy,     Margaret, Hildegonde;     Next come with Barbara     Lucy and Ursula;     And last, queen of the Nine,     Clear-eyed Saint Catherine     Joyful arrayeth her.     Then chooseth each her lad,     And after frolic had     Of dance and carolling     And playing in a ring,     Seek all the woodland shade.     And there for each his lass     Her man a nosegay has,     Which better than word spoken     Might stand to be her token     And emblem of her grace.     For Cecily, who bent     Her slim white neck and went     To Heaven a virgin still,     The nodding daffodil,     That bends but is not shent.     Lucy, whose wounded eyes     Opened in Heaven star-wise,     The lady-smock, whose light     Doth prank the grass with white,     Taketh for badge and prize.     Because for Lord Christ's hest     Men shore thy warm bright breast,     Agatha, see thy part     Showed in the burning heart     Of the white crocus best.     What fate was Barbara's     Shut in the tower of brass,     We figure and hold up     Within the stiff king-cup     That crowns the meadow grass.     Agnes, than whose King Death     Stayed no more delicate breath     On earth, we give for dower     Wood-sorrel, that frail flower     That Spring first quickeneth.     Dorothy, whose shrill voice     Bade Heathendom rejoice,     The sweet-breath'd cowslip hath;     And Margaret, who in death     Saw Heaven, her pearly choice.     Then she of virgin brood     Whom Prince of Britain woo'd,     Ursula, takes by favour     The hyacinth whose savour     Enskies the sunny wood.     Hildegonde, whose spirit high     The Cross did not deny,     Yet blusht to feel the shame,     Anemones must claim,     Whose roses early die.     Last, she who gave in pledge     Her neck to the wheel's edge,     Taketh the fresh primrose     Which (even as she her foes)     Redeems the wintry hedge.     So garlanded, entwined,     Each as may prompt her mind,     The Saints renew for Earth     And Heaven such seemly mirth     As God once had design'd.     And when the day is done,     And veil'd the goodly Sun,     Each man his maid by right     Doth kiss and bid Good-night;     And home goes every one.     The maids to Heaven do hie     To serve God soberly;     The lads, their loves in Heaven,     What lowly work is given     They do, to win the sky.     1896.