MIDSUMMER NIGHT

The perfect disc of the sacred moon

Through still blue heaven serenely swims,

And the lone bird's liquid music brims

The peace of the night with a perfect tune.

This is that holiest night of the year

When ( the mowers say ) may be heard and seen

The ghostly court of the English queen,

Who rides to harry and hunt the deer.

And the woodland creatures cower awake,

A strange unrest is on harts and does,

For the maiden Dian a-hunting goes,

And the trembling deer are afoot in the brake.

They start at a shaken leaf: the sound

Of a dry twig snapped by a squirrel's foot

Is a nameless dread: and to them the hoot

Of a mousing owl is the cry of a hound.

Oh soon the forest will ring with cries,

The dim green coverts will flash: the grass

Will glow as the radiant hunters pass

After the quarry with burning eyes.

The hurrying feet will range unstayed

Of questing goddess and hunted fawn,

Till the east is grey with the sacred dawn,

And the red cock wakens the milking maid.