Summer Ending

Over the world a breath

Has fallen as of Spring; the tender sky

Hangs tremulous, a shield through which the sun

Shines as the heart smiles in a mist of tears.

The trees are green still, but their branches bear

The blossoms of the fall; each quivering birch

Shakes golden coins upon her silver stem;

The little rowan rears his corals gay,

The purple sloes are thick upon the thorn,

And every breeze new-scatters to the ground

Spoils red and yellow. Here upon the hill

Where at our feet bee-haunted heather glows

Among the rocks, sweet peace enfolds us; see,

On velvet slopes afar the patient kine

In silence browse; the plough in furrows wide

Has turned the weary earth to rest; the sun

Sinks and, across the valley, mountains fade

From blue to grey and pearl-like touch the sky.

The hour of silver comes now, for the moon

Awakes and softly films the dusk with light;

The narrow river in her ample bed

Answers the stars, and soft serenity

Has spread her wings upon the earth....

O Heart

Of man!— why must you throb apart and know

A tempered Peace where Nature's Peace is pure?

Already winter's snows upon the hills

Like phantoms to our vision rise; the trees

Groan leafless in the wind, and ghosts of pain

Flit dark between the present and our eyes.

‘ Tis thus we murder Joy, and let To-morrow,

A still-born Terror, anguish dear To-day:

‘ Tis thus, possessing Wealth, we shiver poor

Ere we are stricken: thus our clasped hands

Grow cold and ache with Solitude to be....