"Loveliest of trees, the cherry now..."

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.

by A. E. Housman (1859-1936)

Whenever I see buds on cherry trees, I am instantly transported back in time, to sitting at a much used, kid initialed, wooden desk, in a classroom at an old school.

I clearly see, in my minds eye, my lesson book on the desk. This book, as were all others we used to write our lessons in, were about 8 X 10 inches, lined, the pages stapled to the cover through the center page and were covered, as was required, with wallpaper or some such material. Most of the kids used wallpaper, which, besides being attractive, made it easy to spy your book in the pile left by the teacher after she/he had finished grading your work.

Back to what I was seeing in my minds eye. I can see my lesson book on the desk in front of me, the poem written on the left side of the page, in what I thought was my very best handwriting, and to the right of the poem a beautiful drawing of a cherry tree in full bloom, with very green grass, and yellow flowers growing around the base of the tree. I am sure the flowers were daffodils, as we were also learning the poem The Daffodils, by William Wordsworth. This particular teacher was really into poetry, much to the disgust of some of the students, especially the boys.

Ahhh ! memories, aren't they grand?