A REMONSTRANCE.
To Luke's Little Summer.
Ah, Summer! now thy wayward race is run,
With soft, appeasing smiles thou com'st, like one
Who keeps a pageant waiting all the day,
Till half the guests and all the joy is gone,
And hearts are heavy that awoke so gay.
What though the faithful trees, still gladly green,
Show fretted depths of blue their boughs between,
Though placid sunlight sleeps upon the lawn,
It only tells us of what might have been
Of fickle favours wantonly withdrawn.
Blown with rude winds, and beaten down with rain,
How can the roses dare to trust again
The tricksy mistress whom they once adored?
Even the glad heaven, chilled with stormy stain,
Grudges its skylark pilgrims of its hoard.
Poor is the vintage that the wild bee quiffs,
When the tall simple lilies—the giraffes
That browse on loftier air than other flowers—
When all the blooms, wherewith late Summer laughs,
Like chidden children droop among the bowers.
Oft like a moorhen scuttling to the reeds,
The cricket-ball sped o'er the plashy meads,
And rainbow-blended blazers shrank and ran
When showers, in mockery of his moist needs,
Half-drown'd the water-loving river man.
What woman's rights have crazed thee?
Would'st thou be
A Winter Amazon, more fierce than he?
Can Summer birds thy shrew-heroics sing?
Wilt tend no more the daisies on the lea,
Nor wake thy cowslips up on May morning?
What, shall we brew us possets by the fire
And let the wild rose shiver on the brier.
The cowslip tremble in the meadows chill,
While thy unlovely battle-call wails higher
And dusty squadrons charge adown the hill?
It is too late; thou art no love of mine;
I answer not this sigh, this kiss divine;
The sunlight penitently streaming down
Shines through the paling leaf like thinnest wine
Quaff'd in the clear air of a mountain town.
Farewell! For old love's sake I kiss thy hands;
Go on thy way; away to other lands
That love thee less, and need thee less than we;
Pour out thy passion on some desert sands,
Forget thy lover of the Northern Sea.
Away with fond pretence; let winter come
With snow that strikes the heaviest footfall dumb.
We know the worst, and face his rage with glee;
And, though the world without be ne'er so glum,
Sit by the hearth, and dream and talk—of thee.
Yes, come again with earliest April; stay,
Thyself once more, through the fair time when day
Clasps hand with day, through the brief hush of night—
A twilight bower of roses, where in play
Dance little maidens through from light to light.