The Sun.
London, England, 1852-01-26 00:00:00

SONNETS ON THE MONTH
BY E. E. m. •
(From the Illustrated London Almanack for 162.)
JANUARY.
Spirit of storms and melancholy hours,
Stern January! must we front thy rage,
And at thy beck prepare our choicest flowers
To feed thy graveyards, and thy wrath t' assuage?:
Through driving snows and sleety rains we hear
His coming—spoiler of our homes! 'T is one
To him, the golden locks, or those the young revere
Pauper or prince, so be the deed but done!
Seer-like, unmoved, and with an aspect drear,
In frosted garments stiffening through the night,
He views the pageant of the early bier,
Or cheerless mutters with the stars in sight!
Morn from her lattice strews dark blpsoms now,*
Day comes in tears, and eve with troffbled brow.
* The " rosemary" flowers in January, and is dedicated to
" the dead."

FEBRUARY.
Pillowed on clouds that shine phosphoric 'round,
Lo! February pale thought-wrapt sinears,
Like some proud youth whose sleeping fancies bound
With dull forebodings, all " the future" wears.
Anon young Hope renewing life bestows,
Fans bis cold temples, plants the infant rose;
With magic finger melts the frozen sky
To showery rainbows, at whose lucent fall
Spring-bowers prepare their greenling tracery,
And snow-drops hold the virgin festival.
Loud from the farm bold chanticleer is heard,
Soft at our window sings the sacred bird;
While hill-tops, crown'd with snows and shrouding mists
At ruddy dawn are tipped with amethysts.

Ate acs.
Blown by rude gusts, and rolling scuds t
aloft
March fills the noon; while, loosed in grief, full Ift
The winds bewail or roar in thunders by:
Yonder the forest at the sound inclines
Its hoary boughs, that with the movement shed
Jewels around; and, see! amidst them shines
The daring crocus, with defiant head,
Silver'd with snows, yet opening to,the sky.
Strange are his moods: for now t is splendour all,
Now sullen gloom, now calm, now pregnant shade,
Sunshine and storm; now wakes the waterfall,
Now brookleta flow, and now in ice are stay'd.
Yet, budding out, despite each fickle hour,
Green tints the bank, and promise shapes the flower.

APRIL.
April returns; her blue voluptuous eye,
Now steeped in light, now charged with sudden tears,
Potent as spells enchantress' arts apply.
Lo! at her beck each sapling bloom appears;
Violets whose breath the curious winds endow
Lavish with sweets; anemones; and, more,
Those cups profuse, like drops of gold that blow,
The gaudy wort and yellow hellebore.
Now waters lift their silvery arms, to greet

The green moss thickening rich in noonday sun;
Pastures and lawns and wood-nymphs quaint retreat,
Kindling with sprouts, by thousand dews are spun.
From clasping earth sweet herbs and grasses rise,
Load the fresh gale, and mix congenial sighs.

MAY.
Sweet May is ours! the fresh sun-mantled May,
Blushing and spotless as a bride should be,
With all her lily train of handmaids. See!
Now finger-link'd they come, where smiles the day
In rosy warmth! The modest iris, pure
And dazzling as the dawn of early love;
Pale hyacinths, whose honied lips insure
Caresses frequent as those sighs to allure
They breathe o'erpowering on the gales above.
Nor aught forgotten seeks the bridal queen
Tier showering Daphne, jonquils, or the lair
Snow-hillocks of virginia-stock, whose sheen
Her pathway lights; while earth, and sky, and air,
Rejoicing, each a nuptial aspect wear.