In this ninth season, we are reading six poems about the four seasons of the year. English verse especially is abundant in celebrations, odes, and meditative poems about the divisions of the year and the visible changes in nature that attend them. Over the next several weeks, we will take a look at some fine examples of seasonal poetry. Today's selection is "Loveliest of Trees" by A. E. Houseman; poem begins at timestamp 6:10.

Loveliest of Trees

by A. E. Houseman

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.