Season of
mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close
bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with
him how to load and bless
With
fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend
with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And
fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To
swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With
a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still
more, later flowers for the bees,
Until
they think warm days will never cease,
For
summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.
Who hath
not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes
whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee
sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy
hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a
half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drows'd
with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares
the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And
sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady
thy laden head across a brook;
Or
by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou
watchest the last oozings hours by hours.
Where are
the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?
Think
not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While
barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And
touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a
wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among
the river sallows, borne aloft
Or
sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And
full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets
sing; and now with treble soft
The
red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And
gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
Italics mine.
