A Year in Rhyming Couplets

The first green shoots slip Winter's grasp
Gone for now, the icy blast
Awake once more to the rising sun
The song of blackbirds just begun
Long shut windows thrown open wide
Let clean, clean air flood inside
Heavy coats packed for another day
Hats, boots and gloves, all stored away

Now walk again along the leafy lane
Against blue skies, the weather vane
Streams arush with Winter's melt
The sun on upturned faces felt
Hedgerows glow with opening flowers
Take brief respite from April's showers
In mossy nests, the pale blue of eggs
Upon the hills, lambs on shaky legs

Days lengthening with brighter light
Show skylarks singing in dancing flight
Leaves fading to a deeper green
Hide forms of deer that lie unseen
Until disturbed by rough badger's pass
Or adder's passage through the grass
And gathering high above ripening corn
Climb towering clouds of a Summer storm

From the woods, the cuckoo's call
The flash of swift, the kestrel's fall
Enticing all to come, come and explore
Amidst the ferns of the forest floor
And sandwiches in piles, freshly made
Will be placed on blankets in a sunlit glade
While bare feet splash in tumbling streams
On the village green, play cricket teams

Gone from the sky, the summer haze
Comes cooler air of shorter days
In the trees, the gathering swallows
Geese and starlings and all that follows
Across the downs, the russet leaves
Spiral downward upon the breeze
To lie about in a tumbled heap
Ideal for the hedgehog's Winter sleep

In the air, the scent of fresh turned loam
All gathered in, the harvest home
Threshed wheat sent now to the mills
Sheep summoned down from the hills
Woodlands echo to stag's rutting calls,
The hoot of owls as darkness falls
A lazy wind sweeps across the heath
Against the sky, one single leaf

Across the lane, a fox's track
From den to wood again and back
Hunting for her Winter store
Wind through the trees a sullen roar
In its drey, dreaming of Summers past
A squirrel escapes the icy blast
At home we stoke our fires burning bright
Banishing the coldness of the night

As northern winds howl around the eaves
Shakes the trees and drives the leaves
Puddles ripple with falling rain
Boots and gloves appear once again
First frost rimes the hedgerow sloe
Shining white in the morning's glow
A robin perched upon an abandoned hoe
From darkened skies, a new fall of snow