Love, whose month is ever May: Poetry and Prose for May Day

May by John Clare (1793-1864)

Come queen of months in company

Wi all thy merry minstrelsy
The restless cuckoo absent long
And twittering swallows chimney song
And hedge row crickets notes that run
From every bank that fronts the sun

And swarthy bees about the grass

That stops wi every bloom they pass

Fantasticks by Nicholas Breton (1545/52 -1623/5)

     It is now May, and the sweetness of the air refresheth every spirit: the sunny beams give forth fair blossoms, and the dripping clouds water Flora's great garden....

     It is the month wherein Nature hath her fill of mirth, and the sense are filled with delights.  I conclude it is from the Heavens a grace, and to the earth a gladness.

Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;

Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

   So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

   So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

A Survey of London by John Stow

     In the Month of May, namely on May-day in the morning, every man, except impediment, would walk into the sweet meadows and green woods, there to rejoice their spirits with the beauty and savour of sweet flowers, and with the harmony of birds.....I find also in the month of May, the citizens of London of all estates, lightly in every parish, or sometimes two or three parishes joining together had their several mayings, and did fetch in May-poles, with divers warlike shows, with good archers, morris dancers, and other devices, for pastime all the day long; and toward the evening they had stage plays, and bonfires in the streets.

The Driving Boy by John Clare (1793-1864)

 The driving boy beside his team

Will oer the may month beauty dream

And cock his hat and turn his eye

On flower and tree and deepning skye

And oft bursts loud in fits of song

And whistles as he reels along

Crack[ing] his whip in starts of joy

A happy dirty driving boy

When will my May come? by Richard Barnfield (1574-1627)

When will my May come, that I may embrace thee?

When will the hower be of my soules joying?

If thou wilt come and dwell with me at home,

My sheepcote shall be strowed with new greene rushes

Weele haunt the trembling prickets as they rome

About the fields, along the hauthorne bushes;

I have a pie-bald curre to hunt the hare,

So we will live with daintie forrest fare.

And when it pleaseth thee to walke abroad

Abroad into the fields to take fresh ayre,

The meades with Floras treasure should be strowde,

The mantled meaddowes, and the fields so fayre.

And by a silver well with golden sands

Ile sit me downe, and wash thine ivory hands.

But it thou wilt not pittie my complaint,

My teares, nor vowes, nor oathes, made to thy beautie:

What shall I do but languish, die, or faint,

Since thou dost scorne my teares, and my soules duetie:

And teares contemned, vowes and oaths must faile,

And where teares cannot, nothing can prevaile.

When will my May come, that I may embrace thee?