The longest day

     On yonder hills soft twilight dwells
     And Hesper burns where sunset dies,
     Moist and chill the woodland smells
     From the fern-covered hollows uprise;
     Darkness drops not from the skies,
     But shadows of darkness are flung o’er the vale
     From the boughs of the chestnut, the oak, and the elm,
     While night in yon lines of eastern pines
     Preserves alone her inviolate realm
     Against the twilight pale.

     Say, then say, what is this day,
     That it lingers thus with half-closed eyes,
     When the sunset is quenched and the orient ray
     Of the roseate moon doth rise,
     Like a midnight sun o’er the skies! 
     ’Tis the longest, the longest of all the glad year,
     The longest in life and the fairest in hue,
     When day and night, in bridal light,
     Mingle their beings beneath the sweet blue,
     And bless the balmy air!

     Upward to this starry height
     The culminating seasons rolled;
     On one slope green with spring delight,
     The other with harvest gold,
     And treasures of Autumn untold: 
     And on this highest throne of the midsummer now
     The waning but deathless day doth dream,
     With a rapturous grace, as tho’ from the face
     Of the unveiled infinity, lo, a far beam
     Had fall’n on her dim-flushed brow!

     Prolong, prolong that tide of song,
     O leafy nightingale and thrush! 
     Still, earnest-throated blackcap, throng
     The woods with that emulous gush
     Of notes in tumultuous rush. 
     Ye summer souls, raise up one voice! 
     A charm is afloat all over the land;
     The ripe year doth fall to the Spirit of all,
     Who blesses it with outstretched hand;
     Ye summer souls, rejoice!

     To robin redbreast

     Merrily ’mid the faded leaves,
     O Robin of the bright red breast! 
     Cheerily over the Autumn eaves,
     Thy note is heard, bonny bird;
     Sent to cheer us, and kindly endear us
     To what would be a sorrowful time
     Without thee in the weltering clime: 
     Merry art thou in the boughs of the lime,
     While thy fadeless waistcoat glows on thy breast,
     In Autumn’s reddest livery drest.

     A merry song, a cheery song! 
     In the boughs above, on the sward below,
     Chirping and singing the live day long,
     While the maple in grief sheds its fiery leaf,
     And all the trees waning, with bitter complaining,
     Chestnut, and elm, and sycamore,
     Catch the wild gust in their arms, and roar
     Like the sea on a stormy shore,
     Till wailfully they let it go,
     And weep themselves naked and weary with woe.