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Title: Summer Ending
Author: Laurence Alma-Tadema [ More Titles by Alma-Tadema]
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 claspèd hands Grow cold and ache with Solitude to be.... Kasna, September 1901.
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