English

Sing while you may, O bird upon the tree!
Although on high, wide-winged above the day
Chill evening broadens to immensity;
Sing while you may.

On thee, wide-hovering too, intent to slay,
The hawk's slant pinion buoys him terribly:
Thus near the end is of thy happy lay.

The day and thou and miserable me
Dark wings shall cover up and hide away
Where no song stirs of bird or memory;
Sing while you may.

All you that are to mirth Inclin'd
consider well and bare in mind
What our Good God hath for us don
in sending his beloved sonne
for to redeeme our sowles from thrall
who is the saviour of us all.

Let all your songs and praises bee
Unto his heavenly majestie
And evermore amongst your mirth
remember christ our saviours birth

The twenty fift Day of December
Good cause have we for to remember
In bethlem upon that morne
there was our blest messias borne

That night before the happie tyde

Sing jigmijole the pudding-bowl,
The table and the frame,
My master he did cudgel me
For kissing of my dame.

She's somewhere in the sunlight strong,
—Her tears are in the falling rain,
She calls me in the wind's soft song,
—And with the flowers she comes again.

Yon bird is but her messenger,
—The moon is but her silver car;
Yea! sun and moon are sent by her,
—And every wistful waiting star.

Shady, shady the wood in front of the Hall:
At midsummer full of calm shadows.
The south wind follows summer's train:
With its eddying puffs it blows open my coat.
I am free from ties and can live a life of retirement.
When I rise from sleep, I play with books and harp.
The lettuce in the garden still grows moist:
Of last year's grain there is always plenty left.
Self-support should maintain strict limits:
More than enough is not what I want.
I grind millet and make good wine:
When the wine is heated, I pour it out for myself.

The sea is a wilderness of waves,
A desert of water.
We dip and dive,
Rise and roll,
Hide and are hidden
On the sea.
Day, night,
Night, day,
The sea is a desert of waves,
A wilderness of water.

Said the sparrow to the robin,
“I would surely like to know
What makes these busy humans
Rush about and worry so!”

Said the robin to the sparrow,
“I don't know unless it be
They have no Heavenly Father
To care for them like you and me.”

Round about in a fair ring-a,
Thus we dance and thus we sing-a;
Trip and go, to and fro,
Over this green-a;
All about, in and out,
Over this green-a.

Robins sang in England,
Frost or rain or snow,
All the long December days
Endless years ago.

Robins sang in England
Before the Legions came,
Before our English fields were tilled
Or England was a name.

Robins sang in England
When forests dark and wild
Stretched across from sea to sea
And Jesus was a child.

Listen! in the frosty dawn
From his leafless bough
The same brave song he ever sang
A robin's singing now.

Río Grande de Loíza! … Undulate into my spirit
And let my soul founder in your rivulets,
To seek the fountain that stole you as a child
And in mad haste returned you to the path.

Wind into my lips and let me drink you,
To feel you mine for a brief moment,
And hide you from the world in myself
And hear voices of fear in the mouth of the wind.

Come down for an instant from the spine of the earth,
And seek the intimate secret of my longing;
Confounded in the sweep of my bird fantasies,
Drop a water rose in my dreams.