SH-H-H-H!

What shall we buy for a summer's day?

What is good reading and what is not?

Mabie will tell us — we wait his say;

For Mabie alone can know what's what.

Meanwhile the world is as still as death;

Mute inquiry is in men's looks;

Everybody is holding his breath —

Mabie is reading the summer books.

The suns are at pause in the cosmic race;

The mills of the gods have ceased to grind;

The only sound that is heard in space

Is the rhythmic clicking of Mabie's mind.

Elsewhere silence, or near or far —

Chattering Pleiads or babbling brooks;

For the whisper has passed from star to star:

“Mabie is reading the summer books.”