The Loveliest of Trees

                            Loveliest of Trees

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.

English poet A. E. Houseman (1859-1936) was most likely referring to Prunus avium (wild sweet cherry) which blooms in April....

....while the tree pictured is the one down by the pond Prunus virginiana (chokecherry) which I look forward to see blossoming each May.

I also understand Houseman's sentiment about how few years are left in which to go riding about the woodlands to see the cherry trees hung with snow.