Poetry Pleases: On May Day Morn
Marjorie Upson's poem was inspired by a holiday at Abbot Hall in early May.
A feathered songster sings his solitary note
Before the dawn.
The choir swells to greet the day
On May Day morn.
A green carpet mottled with starry-eyed daisies
Spreads before me.
Celandines and violets vie for coolest place
in shady bower.
The daffodils are almost gone;
in their place stand tulips in rainbow hue
On May Day morn.
May Queens in pink and white
Dip and curtsey in the breeze to shed their gowns
like summer snow.
Beside the path smart felines
stand sentinel.
Each yellow helmet, flat and wide,
Shining and sparkling in the sun.
For May Day’s come.
Chestnut candles shed their light
on aromatic waves, dancing on a bluebell sea.
Weird spindly shapes, thinly clad,
emerge like ghosts through a misty haze.
The once proud felines, now turned white,
await the innocent
puffing time away,
to live again another year
On May Day morn.
