Skip to content
Linespedia

A May-Day Madrigal

Topics: classic

The sun shines fair on Tweedside, the river flowing bright,     Your heart is full of pleasure, your eyes are full of light,     Your cheeks are like the morning, your pearls are like the dew,     Or morning and her dew-drops are like your pearls and you.     Because you are a princess, a princess of the land,     You will not turn your lightsome eyes a moment where I stand,     A poor unnoticed poet, a-making of his rhymes;     But I have found a mistress, more fair a thousand times.     'Tis May, the elfish maiden, the daughter of the Spring,     Upon whose birthday morning the birds delight to sing.     They would not sing one note for you, if you should so command,     Although you are a princess, a princess of the land.

AI analysis available. Enable JavaScript to interact.

About this line

"The sun shines fair on Tweedside, the river flowing bright,..."

Robert Fuller Murray's contribution to classic is further solidified by the brilliance found in "A May-Day Madrigal"... ### Why We Love This Line At Linespedia, we believe that poetry is the ultimate sanctuary for the soul...

Classified Tags

Related lines

"In the hard familiar horse-box I am sitting once again;     Creeping back to old St. Andrews comes the slow North British train,     Bearing be"

"What the end the gods have destined unto thee and unto me,     Ask not: 'tis forbidden knowledge.    Be content, Leuconoe.     Let alone the for"

"O swallow-tailed purveyor of college sprees,     O skilled to please the student fraternity,          Most honoured publican of Scotland,"

"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,     S"

"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

Continue Reading

"In the hard familiar horse-box I am sitting once a..."

Weekly Poetic Insight

Join our literary Sanctuary

Get the most inspiring lines, poetic analysis, and secret shayaris delivered to your inbox every Sunday.