April

fourth month in the Julian and Gregorian calendars
January · February · March · April · May · June · July
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April is the fourth month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. April is commonly associated with the season of spring in the Northern hemisphere and autumn in the Southern hemisphere, where it is the seasonal equivalent to October in the Northern hemisphere and vice versa.

Quotes

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By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard round the world. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
  • Oh to be in England
    Now that April's there,
    And whoever wakes in England
    Sees, some morning, unaware,
    That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
    Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
    While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
    In England - now!
  • Whan that Aprille with his shoures sote
    The droghte of Marche hath perced to the rote,
    And bathed every veyne in swich licour,
    Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
    Whan Zephirus eek with his swete breeth
    Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
    The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
    Hath in the Ram his halfe cours y-ronne,
    And smale fowles maken melodye,
    That slepen al the night with open yë,
    (So priketh hem nature in hir corages):
    Than longen folk to goon on pilgrimages
    (And palmers for to seken straunge strondes)
    To ferne halwes, couthe in sondry londes;
    And specially, from every shires ende
    Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they wende,
    The holy blisful martir for to seke,
    That hem hath holpen, whan that they were seke.
  • April is the cruellest month, breeding
    Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
    Memory and desire, stirring
    Dull roots with spring rain.
    Winter kept us warm, covering
    Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
    A little life with dried tubers.
  • Of all the months that fill the year
    Give April's month to me,
    For earth and sky are then so filled
    With sweet variety !
    • Letitia Elizabeth Landon, "April" in The London Literary Gazette (5 April 1823); also included in The Vow of the Peacock (1835)
  • Will you not come home, brother? you have been long away,
    It's April, and blossom time, and white is the spray;
    And bright is the sun, brother, and warm is the rain, -­
    Will you not come home, brother, home to us again?
  • I have seen dawn and sunset on moors and windy hills
    Coming in solemn beauty like slow old tunes of Spain:
    I have seen the lady April bringing the daffodils,
    Bringing the springing grass and the soft warm April rain.
  • Praise the spells and bless the charms,
    I found April in my arms.
    April golden, April cloudy,
    Gracious, cruel, tender, rowdy;
    April soft in flowered languor,
    April cold with sudden anger,
    Ever changing, ever true—
    I love April, I love you.
    • Ogden Nash, "Always Marry an April Girl" in Versus (1949)
  • If April showers
    Should come your way,
    They bring the flowers
    That bloom in May.
  • April, April,
    Laugh thy girlish laughter;
    Then, the moment after,
    Weep thy girlish tears!
    April, that mine ears
    Like a lover greetest,
    If I tell thee, sweetest,
    All my hopes and fears,
    April, April,
    Laugh thy golden laughter,
    But, the moment after,
    Weep thy golden tears!

Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations

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Quotes reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 38-39.
  • When April winds
    Grew soft, the maple burst into a flush
    Of scarlet flowers. The tulip tree, high up,
    Opened in airs of June her multitude
    Of golden chalices to humming birds
    And silken-wing'd insects of the sky.
  • Old April wanes, and her last dewy morn
    Her death-bed steeps in tears; to hail the May
    New blooming blossoms 'neath the sun are born,
    And all poor April's charms are swept away.
    • John Clare, The Village Minstrel and Other Poems, The Last of April
  • Every tear is answered by a blossom,
    Every sigh with songs and laughter blent,
    Apple-blooms upon the breezes toss them.
    April knows her own, and is content.
  • Now the noisy winds are still;
    April's coming up the hill!
    All the spring is in her train,
    Led by shining ranks of rain;
    Pit, pat, patter, clatter,
    Sudden sun and clatter patter!
    * * * * *
    All things ready with a will,
    April's coming up the hill!
  • The April winds are magical,
    And thrill our tuneful frames;
    The garden-walks are passional
    To bachelors and dames.
  • Oh, the lovely fickleness of an April day!
  • Make me over, Mother April,
    When the sap begins to stir!
    When thy flowery hand delivers
    All the mountain-prisoned rivers,
    And thy great heart beats and quivers,
    To revive the days that were.
  • For April sobs while these are so glad
    April weeps while these are so gay,—
    Weeps like a tired child who had,
    Playing with flowers, lost its way.
  • The children with the streamlets sing,
    When April stops at last her weeping;
    And every happy growing thing
    Laughs like a babe just roused from sleeping.
  • I love the season well
    When forest glades are teeming with bright forms,
    Nor dark and many-folded clouds foretell
    The coming on of storms.
  • Sweet April! many a thought
    Is wedded unto thee, as hearts are wed;
    Nor shall they fail, till, to its autumn brought,
    Life's golden fruit is shed.
  • Sweet April-time—O cruel April-time!
    Year after year returning, with a brow
    Of promise, and red lips with longing paled,
    And backward-hidden hands that clutch the joys
    Of vanished springs, like flowers.
  • The first of April, some do say
    Is set apart for All Fools' Day;
    But why the people call it so,
    Nor I, nor they themselves, do know.
    • Poor Robin's Almanac (1760), "All Fools' Day".
  • The lyric sound of laughter
    Fills all the April hills,
    The joy-song of the crocus,
    The mirth of daffodils.
  • When proud-pied April dress'd in all his trim
    Hath put a spirit of youth in everything.
  • Sweet April's tears,
    Dead on the hem of May
  • A gush of bird-song, a patter of dew,
    A cloud, and a rainbow's warning,
    Suddenly sunshine and perfect blue—
    An April day in the morning.
  • Sweet April showers
    Do bring May flowers.
    • Thomas Tusser, Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry, Chapter XXXIX.
  • Again the blackbirds sing; the streams
    Wake, laughing, from their winter dreams,
    And tremble in the April showers
    The tassels of the maple flowers.
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