The wind is cold, the Spring seems long
a-waking;
The woods are brown and bare;
Yet this is March: soon April
will be making
All things most sweet and fair.
See, even now, in hedge
and thicket tangled,
One brave and cheering sight:
The leafless branches of the Blackthorn,
spangled
With starry blossoms white!
- by Cicely Mary Barker