'Tis not the notes of the homing birds through the first warm April rain,
Or the scarlet buds and the rising green come back to the land again,
That stirs my heart from its winter sleep to pulse to the old refrain;
But when from the miles of bubbling marsh and
the valley's steaming floor,
Shrilling keen with a million flutes the ancient spring-time lore,
I hear the myriad emerald frogs awake in the world once more.
All day when the clouds drive overhead and the shadows run below,
Crossing the wind-swept pasture lots where the thin, red willows glow,
There's not a throat in the joyous host that does not swell and blow.
And all night long to the march of stars the wild mad music thrills,
Voicing the birth of the glad wet spring in a thousand stops and trills,
Till the pale sun lifts through the rosy mists
and floats from the harbour hills.