Over where the mosses Make a coverlet Which the Spring embosses With a green fret, From the long hibernal Dreaminess of sleep Wakes with dimples vernal Little Bo-Peep.
Violets and bluets Mischievously peek; Monks like pigmy druids Play at hide-and-seek; O’er each stump a picket Spies with cunning deep, And in every thicket Beckons Bo-Peep.
The tallyho of slumber’s on The last relay of dreams; Posthaste it rides with ribbons drawn O’er curvetting gray teams. The wayside house just left behind Was Where-the-Cock-Crew Inn; The road ahead with rose is lined And known as Work-to-Win.
Intoxicated senses sink In visions of delight; And Venus’ eye begins to wink Where it outrides the night. Sly fingers lift the window-shades, But ere espied are gone; And on the drowsy milking-maids Tiptoes the Peep-of-Dawn.
Dame Nature in abandon lies With skirts in disarray, And overtaken with surprise Is kissed by stealthy Day; The coverts rub their eyes and wake, And dreaming Love anon Goes forth on Rosy Road to make A tryst with Peep-of-Dawn.
The cold and turbid flood of Spring Has melted to the Summer shallow, And now the vivid greeneries cling Along the margin lush and fallow, And where were sombre deeps and chills Are silver trills of rippling rills.
The loiterer upon the bridge Which o’er the eddying river poises Salutes the island’s sandy ridge That reappears; the eye rejoices In all the old familiar frills And saucy spills of rippling rills.
The rod and reel the rapture feel And from the boat take finny chances, But less for luck than with the keel To be a part of runic dances; For thus the river’s music thrills Like joy that fills the rippling rills.
Cherries! Cherries! Cherries! The robins are excited and delighted To change the fare at last; For ’twas bugs and grubs and slugs Over two months past. Now it’s cherries till the berries Ripen full and fast.
Cherries! Cherries! Cherries! The robins are excited and affrighted; There’s a man up the tree In a big wig and rig That would scare a chickadee-- But a robin--see him bobbin’ In a solemn colloquy!
Cherries! Cherries! Cherries! The scare-crow is indicted and requited With a pocketful of eggs Baby-blue, with ’em too Gettin’ ready bill and legs For the Summer that’s a comer When the cherry-season begs.