Three Love Songs: Love’s Fate When daisies pied and violets blue, And lady-smocks so silver-white, And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue Do paint the meadows with delight, The cuckoo, then, from every tree Mocks married men, for thus sings he: Cuckoo! Cuckoo! O word of fear, Unpleasing to the married ear! When shepherds pipe on oaten straws, And merry larks are ploughmen’s clocks, When turtles tread, and rooks and daws, And maidens bleach their summer smocks, The cuckoo, then, on every tree Mocks married men, for thus sings he: Cuckoo! Cuckoo! O word of fear, Unpleasing to the married ear!