My Virtual Reading Room

Song for a Personal Prejudice

January's bearable
 In spite of bad report.
Though February's terrible,
 It's short.
With snows in proper season,
 Each burdens down the larch.
But March is full of treason,
 And I hate March.

Hold your hats and duck, boys, March is nearly due,
The sleet is on the windowpane, the slush is on the shoe,
The pneumococcus carols a loud, triumphant song,
And not a holiday's in sight the whole month long.

On many a wedding present
 In June my ducats fly.
The temperature's unpleasant
 In July.
As August airs grow olden,
 Hay fever's what I got.
But any time seems golden
 Compared to you-know-what.

Pick your shovels up, lads, you'll never know reprieve,
For March is on the threshold with a blizzard up its sleeve,
With a pussy-willow fable that is feeble on its facts,
And a brand-new estimation of your extra income tax.

October leaves I rake with
 An ardor far from faint,
And April wetting take with-
 Out complaint.
Serene, in weather lawful,
 I shiver or I parch.
But March is merely awful.
 I can't stand March.

Away, that month despicable, those days of dread and doubt,
When the gale blows down the chimney and the oil is running out.
(Besides, I own a private cause to call the time accurst--
I'll have another birthday when it's March the twenty-first.)

(Phyllis McGinley)