SUMMER

Winter is cold-hearted
  Spring is yea and nay,
Autumn is a weather-cock
  Blown every way: 
Summer days for me
When every leaf is on its tree;

When Robin’s not a beggar,
  And Jenny Wren’s a bride,
And larks hang singing, singing, singing,
  Over the wheat-fields wide, 10
  And anchored lilies ride,
And the pendulum spider
  Swings from side to side,

And blue-black beetles transact business,
  And gnats fly in a host,
And furry caterpillars hasten
  That no time be lost,
And moths grow fat and thrive,
And ladybirds arrive.

Before green apples blush, 20
  Before green nuts embrown,
Why, one day in the country
  Is worth a month in town;
  Is worth a day and a year
Of the dusty, musty, lag-last fashion
  That days drone elsewhere.

AUTUMN

I dwell alone—­I dwell alone, alone,
  Whilst full my river flows down to the sea,
Gilded with flashing boats
  That bring no friend to me: 
O love-songs, gurgling from a hundred throats,
  O love-pangs, let me be.

Fair fall the freighted boats which gold and stone
    And spices bear to sea: 
Slim, gleaming maidens swell their mellow notes,
    Love-promising, entreating—­ 10
    Ah! sweet, but fleeting—­
  Beneath the shivering, snow-white sails. 
  Hush! the wind flags and fails—­
Hush! they will lie becalmed in sight of strand—­
  Sight of my strand, where I do dwell alone;
Their songs wake singing echoes in my land—­
  They cannot hear me moan.

  One latest, solitary swallow flies
    Across the sea, rough autumn-tempest tossed,
    Poor bird, shall it be lost? 20
  Dropped down into this uncongenial sea,
        With no kind eyes
        To watch it while it dies,
     Unguessed, uncared for, free: 
        Set free at last,
        The short pang past,
In sleep, in death, in dreamless sleep locked fast.

Mine avenue is all a growth of oaks,
    Some rent by thunder strokes,
Some rustling leaves and acorns in the breeze; 30
    Fair fall my fertile trees,
That rear their goodly heads, and live at ease.

A spider’s web blocks all mine avenue;
  He catches down and foolish painted flies
    That spider wary and wise. 
Each morn it hangs a rainbow strung with dew
  Betwixt boughs green with sap,
  So fair, few creatures guess it is a trap: 
    I will not mar the web,
Though sad I am to see the small lives ebb. 40