Cherry blossom

[wolfinthewood]

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.

A. E. Housman (1859–1936)

from A Shropshire Lad (1896)


Wikipedia says that Housman couldn’t find a publisher for A Shropshire Lad and published it himself. I didn’t know that. I assume it is true. More evidence that any blanket prejudice against self-published work is merely snobbish.


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