A Calendar of Sonnets: May

Helen Hunt Jackson 1830 (Amherst, Massachusetts) – 1885 (San Francisco)



O Month when they who love must love and wed!
Were one to go to worlds where May is naught,
And seek to tell the memories he had brought
From earth of thee, what were most fitly said?
I know not if the rosy showers shed
From apple-boughs, or if the soft green wrought
In fields, or if the robin's call be fraught
The most with thy delight. Perhaps they read
Thee best who in the ancient time did say
Thou wert the sacred month unto the old:
No blossom blooms upon thy brightest day
So subtly sweet as memories which unfold
In aged hearts which in thy sunshine lie,
To sun themselves once more before they die.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 14, 2023

36 sec read
132

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABBAABBACDCDEE
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 617
Words 120
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 14

Helen Hunt Jackson

Helen Maria Hunt Jackson, born Helen Fiske, was an American poet and writer who became an activist on behalf of improved treatment of Native Americans by the United States government. more…

All Helen Hunt Jackson poems | Helen Hunt Jackson Books

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