Let hate die out, take rest, poor workers, be all at peace;
Let the angry battle abate, and the barren bitterness cease!
Ah, pleasant and pastoral picture! Thrice welcome whoever shall
bring
The sunshine of love after Winter, the blossoms of joy with the
Spring!
Wilt THOU bring it, O new May Queen? If thou canst, come and rule
us, and take
The laurel, the palm, and the paean; all bondage but thine we would
break,
And welcome the branch and the dove. But we look, and we hold our
breath,
That is not the visage of Love, and beneath the piled blossoms
lurks--Death!
A Society all of Love and of Brotherhood! Beautiful dream!
But alas for this Promise of May! Do not Labour's Floralia seem
As flower-feasts fair to her followers? Look on the wreaths at her
feet,
Flung by enthusiast hands from the mine, and the mill, and the
street,
Piled flower-offerings, thine, Proletariat Queen of the May!
And what means the new Bona Dea? and what would her suppliants say?
Organised strength, solidarity, power to band and to strike,
Hope that is native to Spring,--and Hate, in all seasons alike;
Mutual trust of the many--and menace malign for the few.
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