At the Spring Dawn

I watched the dawn come,
    Watched the spring dawn come.
And the red sun shouldered his way up
    Through the grey, through the blue,
Through the lilac mists.
The quiet of it! The goodness of it!
    And one bird awoke, sang, whirred
A blur of moving black against the sun,
    Sang again—afar off.
And I stretched my arms to the redness of the sun,
    Stretched to my finger tips,
        And I laughed.
Ah! It is good to be alive, good to love,
    At the dawn,
        At the spring dawn.

This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on March 26, 2022, by the Academy of American Poets.

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“At the Spring Dawn” appeared in Negro Poets and Their Poems (The Associated Publishers, 1923).