Skip to content
QuillOak

Lyric Poem · Nature

Spring

by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Birds' love and birds' song

Flying here and there,

Birds' songand birds' love

And you with gold for hair!

Birds' songand birds' love

Passing with the weather,

Men's song and men's love,

To love once and forever.

Men's love and birds' love,

And women's love and men's!

And you my wren with a crown of gold,

You my queen of the wrens!

You the queen of the wrens —

We'll be birds of a feather,

I'll be King of the Queen of the wrens,

And all in a nest together.

Full-text availability follows the United States display decision recorded below; status can differ elsewhere.

Quick facts

Poem
Spring
Poet
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Length
16 lines
Form
Lyric Poem
Themes
Nature, Love, Spring

Craft notes

How this poem works

Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.

Shape
16 lines · 2 octaves
Refrain
Birds' songand birds' loveRepeated lines act as the poem's hinge or drumbeat.

Want the rules this form is measured against? Read what makes a lyric poem, or run your own draft through the form checker to see the same measurements on your lines. How we measure · Report a mistake

Text, source & rights

A traceable edition

Full-text display is based on the committed source record and a United States term-expiry review.

Author record
Alfred, Lord Tennyson1809–1892
Source record
PoetryDBSpring by alfred-lord-tennyson, PoetryDB transcription
Display decision
Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
Publication record
Not recorded in the imported source
Text fingerprint
SHA-256 edb3d2613673cbe7
Editorial handling
Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.
Jurisdiction-specific, never a worldwide claimRights policyReport a text or rights issue

Keep reading

More nature poems