No More Learning

_April. _

Birth means dying,
As wings and wind mean flying;
So you and I and all things fly or die;
And sometimes I sit sighing to think of dying.
But meanwhile I've a rainbow in my showers,
And a lapful of flowers,
And these dear nestlings aged three hours;
And here's their mother sitting,
Their father's merely flitting
To find their breakfast somewhere in my bowers.

[As she speaks April shows March her apron full of flowers
and nest full of birds. March wanders away into the
grounds. April, without entering the cottage, hangs over
the hungry nestlings watching them. ]

_April. _

What beaks you have, you funny things,
What voices shrill and weak;
Who'd think that anything that sings
Could sing through such a beak?
Yet you'll be nightingales one day,
And charm the country-side,
When I'm away and far away
And May is queen and bride.

[May arrives unperceived by April, and gives her a kiss.
April starts and looks round. ]

_April. _

Ah May, good-morrow May, and so good-bye.

_May. _

That's just your way, sweet April, smile and sigh:
Your sorrow's half in fun,
Begun and done
And turned to joy while twenty seconds run.
I've gathered flowers all as I came along,
At every step a flower
Fed by your last bright shower,--

[She divides an armful of all sorts of flowers with April, who
strolls away through the garden. ]

_May. _

And gathering flowers I listened to the song
Of every bird in bower.
The world and I are far too full of bliss
To think or plan or toil or care;
The sun is waxing strong,
The days are waxing long,
And all that is,
Is fair.

Here are my buds of lily and of rose,
And here's my namesake-blossom, may;
And from a watery spot
See here forget-me-not,
With all that blows
To-day.

Hark to my linnets from the hedges green,
Blackbird and lark and thrush and dove,
And every nightingale
And cuckoo tells its tale,
And all they mean
Is love.

[June appears at the further end of the garden, coming slowly
towards May, who, seeing her, exclaims]

_May. _

Surely you're come too early, sister June.

_June. _

Indeed I feel as if I came too soon
To round your young May moon
And set the world a-gasping at my noon.
Yet come I must. So here are strawberries
Sun-flushed and sweet, as many as you please;
And here are full-blown roses by the score,
More roses, and yet more.

[May, eating strawberries, withdraws among the flower beds. ]

_June. _

The sun does all my long day's work for me,
Raises and ripens everything;
I need but sit beneath a leafy tree
And watch and sing.

[Seats herself in the shadow of a laburnum.