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Quotations about March
Welcome to my page of quotations about the month of March. Here in the desert, our third month of the year brings daytime temperatures that can feel more like summer, but it is beautiful nonetheless! Wildflowers and green return to the buzzing earth; mornings and evenings are heavenly, as are the breezes. I've spent much time over the years going through old books picking out excerpts about this lovely month, and I gleefully present them here for all to enjoy. Happy springtime to you!
December days were brief and chill,
The winds of March were wild and drear,
And, nearing and receding still,
Spring never would, we thought, be here.
~Arthur Hugh Clough (1819–1861)
Our life is March weather, savage and serene in one hour. We go forth austere, dedicated, believing in the iron links of Destiny, and will not turn on our heel to save our life: but a book, or a bust, or only the sound of a name, shoots a spark through the nerves, and we suddenly believe in will... ~Ralph Waldo Emerson, Representative Men: Seven Lectures, "IV: Montaigne; Or, the Skeptic," 1849, published 1850
It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade. ~Charles Dickens, Great Expectations, 1861
March with grief doth howl and rave... ~Percy Bysshe Shelley, "Dirge for the Year," 1821
Despite March's windy reputation, winter isn't really blown away; it is washed away. It flows down all the hills, goes swirling down the valleys and spills out to sea. Like so many of this earth's elements, winter itself is soluble in water.... It is a wet world, winter's harsh grip beginning to relax.... An outcropping ledge on the hillside sheds its beard of icicles and becomes a seep spring that drips into a shallow pool that feeds a growing runlet. ~"Washing Winter Away," The New York Times, 1964 March 17th
As through the poplar's gusty spire
The March wind sweeps and sings,
I sit beside the hollow fire,
And dream familiar things;
Old memories wake, faint echoes make
A murmur of dead Springs...
~"Long Ago," in Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, Conducted by William and Robert Chambers, 1868 October 24th
The day before April
Alone, alone,
I walked in the woods
And I sat on a stone.
I sat on a broad stone
And sang to the birds.
The tune was God's making
But I made the words.
~Mary Carolyn Davies, "The Day Before April," Youth Riding, 1919
They captured in their ramble all the mysteries and magics of a March evening. Very still and mild it was, wrapped in a great, white, brooding silence — a silence which was yet threaded through with many little silvery sounds which you could hear if you hearkened as much with your soul as your ears. The girls wandered down a long pineland aisle that seemed to lead right out into the heart of a deep-red, overflowing winter sunset. "I'd go home and write a poem this blessed minute if I only knew how," declared Phil, pausing in an open space where a rosy light was staining the green tips of the pines. ~L. M. Montgomery, Anne of the Island, 1915
April Fool, n. The March fool with another month added to his folly. ~Ambrose Bierce
Now when the primrose makes a splendid show,
And lilies face the March-winds in full blow,
And humbler growths as moved with one desire
Put on, to welcome spring, their best attire...
~William Wordsworth, "Poor Robin," March 1840 ["Poor robin" is a wild geranium — Geranium Robertianum — also known as herb-Robert.
And so by degrees the winter wore away... and the chill, bitter, windy, early spring came round. The comic almanacks give us dreadful pictures of January and February; but, in truth, the months which should be made to look gloomy in England are March and April. Let no man boast himself that he has got through the perils of winter till at least the seventh of May. ~Anthony Trollope (1815–1882), The Chronicles of Barsetshire, Vol. III: Doctor Thorne, "Chapter XLVII: How the Bride Was Received, and Who Were Asked to the Wedding," 1858
March brings breezes loud and shrill,
Stirs the dancing daffodil...
~Sara Coleridge (1802–1852), "The Months"
March so fickle, March so fair,
Pouting, shy, with wind-blown hair,
Nut-brown shawl and crocus cup,
Smile that lights the whole world up.
~Sara L. Vickers Oberholtzer, "The Lady March," Souvenirs of Occasions, 1892
February makes a bridge and March breakes it. ~Witts Recreations, Selected from the Finest Fancies of Moderne Muses, with a Thousand Outlandish Proverbs (edited by George Herbert, 1593–1633)
I shook off the house like a hooded cape,
And came out, free, into the March-blown street...
At a lash of the gale, at a sight of the cloud-tattered skies,
As a coat discarded,
I shook off civilization
And became wild,
And my naked soul raced the clouds,
And the flavour of the Earth was fresh and primitive…
~James Oppenheim, "March Night," War and Laughter, 1916
Mud and monotony, mournful and malignant weather, and a general feeling of mental mustiness. Meditation on and morbid longings for the true ethereal mildness... Mildew, mopiness, and moodiness.
Arctic atmosphere, followed by aerobatic temperature-ascensions. Anguish at absence of heat in the apartment at one moment, and acute agony at over-heating a moment later. Addlepated athletes discuss salaries, pennant aspirations, et al... Arrival of California asparagus and anticipation of April.
Rain, with occasional relapses into snow. Reports of robins from the rural districts, followed by zero weather. Roguish rise and retreat of the stock-market at any and all rumors. Rueful regard of another session of Congress, and dread of the resultant rumpus... Leaky rubbers. Rheumatism.
Chills, coughs and colds. Contempt and loathing for the city, and acute craving for the country...
Hoarseness, ill-humor, and increasing horror at the high cost of hash, hardware, and homes... Hailstones, half-frozen hands, hateful habitations, tottering health. Hades! ~"The Hopeless Month," Puck, March 1917
He stands like a warder stout and strong,
In the open gate of the year...
~J.J. Britton (1832–1913), "March"
March with her thralls,
And wayward brawls,
The spring-time calls;
Calls o'er the lawn
For break of dawn,
And summer fawn,
And tells the trees
In racking breeze,
To wake from ease;
Whispers the roots
To send their shoots
In green surtouts...
~Sara L. Vickers Oberholtzer, "March," Violet Lee, and Other Poems, 1873
Missing springtime is like missing a woman. You never really noticed her and then she was gone, and all that she was returns and makes the separation even more painful.
I think I read this somewhere. "Springtime is the land awakening. The March winds are the morning yawn."
~Lewis Grizzard (1946–1994), "Covering the arrival of spring"
Across the shaken bastions of the year
March drives his windy chariot-wheels of cold.
Somewhere, they tell me, Spring is waiting near...
~Arthur Davison Ficke, Sonnets of a Portrait-Painter, 1914
March, when days are getting long,
Let thy growing hours be strong
To set right some wintry wrong.
~Caroline May, 1887
Though the groundhog and crocus creep into their holes
It's Spring, and the almanac shows it;
Though a polar wave over the continent rolls
It's Spring! And we don't care who knows it!
~Robert J. Burdette, "March," c.1888
To wellcome her the Spring breath's forth
Elisian sweets; March strews the Earth
With violetts and posies,
The Sunne renews his fainting fires,
Aprill putts on her best attires,
And May her crown off Roses.
~Most assuredly written by Edmund Waller, c.1638–9 [About Dorothèa, i.e. Lady Dorothy Sidney, i.e. Saccharissa, his object of unrequited love.
I love, till my heart is red as February and purple as March. ~Emily Dickinson
I hear the sparrow's ditty
Anear my study door;
A simple song of gladness
That winter days are o'er;
My heart is singing with him,
I love him more and more....
Oh, Spring is surely coming,
Her couriers fill the air;
Each morn are new arrivals,
Each night her ways prepare;
I scent her fragrant garments,
Her foot is on the stair.
~John Burroughs (1837–1921), "A March Glee," c.1902
March is blustery and boisterous,
Never quiet nor inert,
Swaggers in and out with gusto—
March is just an extravert.
~Thelma Ireland, "March," c. 1949
The stormy March has come at last,
With wind, and cloud, and changing skies;
I hear the rushing of the blast,
That through the snowy valley flies...
For thou, to northern lands again,
The glad and glorious sun dost bring,
And thou hast joined the gentle train
And wear'st the gentle name of Spring.
~William Cullen Bryant (1794–1878), "March"
I would I had some flowers o' the spring that might
Become your time of day... daffodils,
That come before the swallow dares, and take
The winds of March with beauty; violets dim,
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes...
O, these I lack,
To make you garlands of, and my sweet friend,
To strew him o'er and o'er!
~William Shakespeare, The Winter's Tale, c.1610 [IV, 4, Perdita]
It is the first mild day of March:
Each minute sweeter than before...
There is a blessing in the air,
Which seems a sense of joy to yield
To the bare trees, and mountains bare,
And grass in the green field...
We from to-day, my Friend, will date
The opening of the year.
Love, now an universal birth,
From heart to heart is stealing,
From earth to man, from man to earth:
—It is the hour of feeling.
~William Wordsworth (1770–1850), "To My Sister"
These, marching softly, thus in order went,
And after them, the Months all riding came;
First, sturdy March, with Brows full sternly bent,
And armed strongly, rode upon a Ram,
The same which over Hellespontus swam:
Yet in his Hand a Spade he also hent,
And in a Bag all sorts of Seeds ysame,
Which on the Earth he strowed as he went,
And fill'd her Womb with fruitful Hope of Nourishment.
~Edmund Spenser, The Fairy-Queen, 1590s
Indoors or out, no one relaxes
In March, that month of wind and taxes,
The wind will presently disappear,
The taxes last us all the year.
~Ogden Nash, "Thar She Blows," 1949
March borrows nine days of April. ~Folk-Lore from Maryland, collected by Annie Weston Whitney and Caroline Canfield Bullock, 1925
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