Reluctantly the summer goes;
The crimson radiance of the rose
Is ashen in the garden-close.
There is a pleading plaintiveness
In the long hill-wind's low caress,
Heart-moving and yet passionless.
The noons are heavy with the heat,
And still, save for the thin-drawn beat
Of the cicada, shrilly-sweet.
Faintly the groves begin to grieve,
And grows more mournful eve by eve
The music-web the thrushes weave.
And Love, erewhile in vernal guise,
Adown the land, in pensive wise,
Now wanders with averted eyes.
