To find with you the earliest
Willow-buds before their silver turns to gold,
And the first previous buttercup and cyclamen that blossom
Ere the leaflets of the vernal trees unfold;
To lie with you in June
Beneath a broad magnolia-scented moon,
And under stars and meteors of late summer;
To see with you
The goldenrod become an ashen ghost
And the rose of autumn crumble
And the leaf put on the splendor of the rose,
And the last leaf fall upon the wintry blue
In a wind from the lofty snows;
To sit with you beside the murmuring fire
When a stifled sunset dies,
And watch through misty panes
The boughs that toss upon a winter-driven sky
And the swift eternal slanting of dark rains:
These are my seasons,
This is my calendar,
Where love appoints the course of many a sun and star;
And, wanting you, I should not care nor know
If it were the time of falling jasmine-petals Or the time of falling snow.
Clark Ashton Smith
