The Crocus Flame

The Easter sunrise flung a bar of gold O'er the awakening wold. What was thine answer, O thou brooding earth, What token of re-birth, Of tender vernal mirth, Thou the long-prisoned in the bonds of cold?

Under the kindling panoply which God Spreads over tree and clod, I looked far abroad. Umber the sodden reaches seemed and seer As when the dying year, With rime-white sandals shod, Faltered and fell upon its frozen bier. Of some rathe quickening, some divine Renascence not a sign!

And yet, and yet, With touch of viol-chord, with mellow fret, The lyric South amid the bough-tops stirred, And one lone bird An unexpected jet Of song projected through the morning blue, As though some wondrous hidden thing it knew.

And so I gathered heart, and cried again: "O earth, make plain, At this matutinal hour, The triumph and the power Of life eternal over death and pain, Although it be but by some simple flower!"

And then, with sudden light, Was dowered my veiled sight, And I beheld in a sequestered place A slender crocus show its sun-bright face. O miracle of Grace, Earth's Easter answer came, The revelation of transfiguring Might, In that small crocus flame!