Mine are the longest days, the loveliest nights; The mower’s scythe makes music to my ear; I am the mother of all dear delights; I am the fairest daughter of the year.

There’s a place that I go to in memory That’s as real as a place can be. It is sand and shingles and sea grass And a sweep of wind-whisked sea.

Lilacs in dooryards Holding quiet conversations with an early moon; Lilacs watching a deserted house Settling sideways into the grass of an old road.

The bud stands for all things, even for those things that don’t flower, for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing.

His voice shall chant, in accents clear, Throughout the live-long day, Till the first silver star appear, The sovereignty of May.

May memory restore again and again The smallest color of the smallest day: Time is the school in which we learn, Time is the fire in which we burn.

Keep close to Nature’s heart . . . and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.

Spring, hold back the sun, Hold back the gentle rain, Let the wind blow greedy Gusts against the branches Until the treetops rattle And the buds are hard.

Let the rain kiss you. Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops. Let the rain sing you a lullaby. The rain makes still pools on the sidewalk.

I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o’er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils.

All Nature seems at work. Slugs leave their lair The bees are stirring, birds are on the wing, And Winter slumbering in the open air, Wears on his smiling face a dream of spring.

Should we clap our hands and dance The Something Dance, the welcoming Something Dance? I think we should, love, I think we should.

Each time, the found world surprises — that is its nature. And then what is said by all lovers: “What fools we were, not to have seen.”

Each time, the found world surprises — that is its nature. And then what is said by all lovers: "What fools we were, not to have seen."

March is the month of expectation, The things we do not know, The Persons of Prognostication Are coming now.

When the first bird sings and the first bud opes, And the faint perfume from its chalice steals — I know what the caged bird feels!

The last light of the sun Lies over the pasture Where sheep are grazing. Off toward the sea, Where the pasture dips to the dunes.

Winter is the time for comfort, for good food and warmth, for the touch of a friendly hand and for a talk beside the fire: it is the time for home.

And winter, slumbering in the open air, Wears on his smiling face a dream of spring; And I, the while, the sole unbusy thing, Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, nor sing.

What would the world be, once bereft Of wet and wildness? Let them be left, O let them be left, wildness and wet, Long live the weeds and the wildness yet.