THE JUNE
The June has come with all its brilliant dyes,
Its honeyed breath, its balmy gusts and sighs,
In fields and stretching up-lands, glade and glen,
And by the high and lowly haunts of men,
With all-surpassing glory bloom the flowers,
And come are sun-lit skies and dreamy hours.
The morning earth is all begemmed with dew.
The toiling bee the blissful hours through
Hums softly on his self-beguiling tune,
While gathers he the sweetest sweets of June.
Low murmuring the crystal brooklet leads
Its way through fields and lane and emerald meads.
The clover fields are red and sweetly scent
The pasture lands, where browse the kine content.
The corn is swayed with breezes passing by,
And everywhere the bloom is on the rye.
Already on the bearded wheat is seen
The gold which tempts the farmer’s sickle keen,
And I can almost see the gleaming blade
By which the golden grain is lowly laid;
And hear the singing scythe and tramp of feet,
And see the cone-shaped shocks of wheat.
All shimmering the landscapes far and wide
Bespeak fair promise for the harvest tide.
The June has come with summer skies and glow,
Reflecting bliss and Junes of long ago—
Bare feet, and careless roving bands of boys
That haunted lake and stream in halcyon joys,
The bow and arrow, hunting ground and snares,
The sudden flight of quails and skulking hares,
The wild and joyous shouts along the glen
Come back in all the month of June again.
Then other days and solitary dreams
Are come again with flash of flaming gleams,
Where red birds shot across the opening glades,
In quest of deeper thickets, deeper shades.
Again far inland, on and on I tread,
Where cooling shades and carpets green are spread
And modestly the violet blooms and sups
The dew; and glow the golden butter-cups;
And sweet the odor of the woods I scent
Where perfume of a thousand kinds is spent.
And stretched full length upon the ground
I lie and watch the leaves and hear their sound
And wonder what their whisperings include
To tell of life spent in such solitude.
Here dreaming on forgetting time and men
The June a million visions brings again,
In imagery so rare of that and this,
A self-forgetting turmoil, nameless bliss.
Unseen but felt, the spirit of the wood
Without a dogma teaches of the good
In God sublime. An all-pervading sense
Is everywhere of his resource immense,
His love ineffable—infinite power,
In storm resisting oaks, and purple flower
Scarce lifting up its head an inch above the ground
Is seen alike, and with the joyous sound
Which Robin-Redbreast from a tree top trills
Full orthodox confession comes and fills
The heart. The lip is mute but deep a sigh
The spirit sendeth upward to the sky
Baptized in faith, its adoration, love,
A credo of the soul, to God above.
The June has come with all its brilliant dyes,
Its honeyed breath, its balmy gusts and sighs.
The soft sunshine comes down aslant the hills,
With perfume sweet the honeysuckle fills
The summer atmosphere for miles around,
And all the groves and fields are sweet with sound,
While hills, and woods and vale and grassy slope
Are teeming everywhere with life and hope.
Come out, ye sons of men from street and ward,
Come forth again upon the welcome sward,
At least for one brief day leave toilsome care
In offices and stifling banks and wear
The boyish spirit over field and glen,
Drink deep once more of all his joys again.
The way is not so long—the brook in size
Has lost to longer legs and manhood eyes,
But its low murmuring the morning through
Is still a lullaby; and love is true
In brook and field, and sky, and dale and glen
For all the changing, faithless sons of men.
In these no hot contentions, endless strife,
Nor aching hearts, consuming greed of life,
No soul-corrupting lusts, debasing sin,
Nor blighted lives where innocence has been
Are ever brought by June. But to assuage
The sorrows of mankind from age to age
A subtle charm, a bliss, a merry tune
Abideth in the country lap of June.
Come out where kindly nature deftly weaves
Her cooling bowers with the tender leaves
Ye tired wives and husbands vexed with care.
And find life’s true elixir in the air.
Let tinkling bells of flocks and browsing herd,
The song of brooks and twitter of the bird
Unite with children voices in their shout
Of mirth and joy on all the sward about,
And let the maidens come with rosy cheeks
And merry boys with gallantry that speaks
Of dawning love, and sentiment the best
That ever came to swell the human breast;
Let all come forth in holiday array
From care, and feel the bliss of one June day.
The June has come with all its brilliant dyes,
Its honeyed breath, its balmy gusts and sighs,
In fields and stretching up-lands, glade and glen,
And by the high and lowly haunts of men,
With all-surpassing glory bloom the flowers,
And come are sun-lit skies and dreamy hours.
The morning earth is all begemmed with dew.
The toiling bee the blissful hours through
Hums softly on his self-beguiling tune,
While gathers he the sweetest sweets of June.
Low murmuring the crystal brooklet leads
Its way through fields and lane and emerald meads.
The clover fields are red and sweetly scent
The pasture lands, where browse the kine content.
The corn is swayed with breezes passing by,
And everywhere the bloom is on the rye.
Already on the bearded wheat is seen
The gold which tempts the farmer’s sickle keen,
And I can almost see the gleaming blade
By which the golden grain is lowly laid;
And hear the singing scythe and tramp of feet,
And see the cone-shaped shocks of wheat.
All shimmering the landscapes far and wide
Bespeak fair promise for the harvest tide.
The June has come with summer skies and glow,
Reflecting bliss and Junes of long ago—
Bare feet, and careless roving bands of boys
That haunted lake and stream in halcyon joys,
The bow and arrow, hunting ground and snares,
The sudden flight of quails and skulking hares,
The wild and joyous shouts along the glen
Come back in all the month of June again.
Then other days and solitary dreams
Are come again with flash of flaming gleams,
Where red birds shot across the opening glades,
In quest of deeper thickets, deeper shades.
Again far inland, on and on I tread,
Where cooling shades and carpets green are spread
And modestly the violet blooms and sups
The dew; and glow the golden butter-cups;
And sweet the odor of the woods I scent
Where perfume of a thousand kinds is spent.
And stretched full length upon the ground
I lie and watch the leaves and hear their sound
And wonder what their whisperings include
To tell of life spent in such solitude.
Here dreaming on forgetting time and men
The June a million visions brings again,
In imagery so rare of that and this,
A self-forgetting turmoil, nameless bliss.
Unseen but felt, the spirit of the wood
Without a dogma teaches of the good
In God sublime. An all-pervading sense
Is everywhere of his resource immense,
His love ineffable—infinite power,
In storm resisting oaks, and purple flower
Scarce lifting up its head an inch above the ground
Is seen alike, and with the joyous sound
Which Robin-Redbreast from a tree top trills
Full orthodox confession comes and fills
The heart. The lip is mute but deep a sigh
The spirit sendeth upward to the sky
Baptized in faith, its adoration, love,
A credo of the soul, to God above.
The June has come with all its brilliant dyes,
Its honeyed breath, its balmy gusts and sighs.
The soft sunshine comes down aslant the hills,
With perfume sweet the honeysuckle fills
The summer atmosphere for miles around,
And all the groves and fields are sweet with sound,
While hills, and woods and vale and grassy slope
Are teeming everywhere with life and hope.
Come out, ye sons of men from street and ward,
Come forth again upon the welcome sward,
At least for one brief day leave toilsome care
In offices and stifling banks and wear
The boyish spirit over field and glen,
Drink deep once more of all his joys again.
The way is not so long—the brook in size
Has lost to longer legs and manhood eyes,
But its low murmuring the morning through
Is still a lullaby; and love is true
In brook and field, and sky, and dale and glen
For all the changing, faithless sons of men.
In these no hot contentions, endless strife,
Nor aching hearts, consuming greed of life,
No soul-corrupting lusts, debasing sin,
Nor blighted lives where innocence has been
Are ever brought by June. But to assuage
The sorrows of mankind from age to age
A subtle charm, a bliss, a merry tune
Abideth in the country lap of June.
Come out where kindly nature deftly weaves
Her cooling bowers with the tender leaves
Ye tired wives and husbands vexed with care.
And find life’s true elixir in the air.
Let tinkling bells of flocks and browsing herd,
The song of brooks and twitter of the bird
Unite with children voices in their shout
Of mirth and joy on all the sward about,
And let the maidens come with rosy cheeks
And merry boys with gallantry that speaks
Of dawning love, and sentiment the best
That ever came to swell the human breast;
Let all come forth in holiday array
From care, and feel the bliss of one June day.
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