Helen Hunt Jackson
No days such honored days as these! When yet Fair Aphrodite reigned, men seeking wide For some fair thing which should forever bide
Silence again. The glorious symphony Hath need of pause and interval of peace. Some subtle signal bids all sweet sounds cease,
The lakes of ice gleam bluer than the lakes Of water 'neath the summer sunshine gleamed: Far fairer than when placidly it streamed,
Still lie the sheltering snows, undimmed and white; And reigns the winter's pregnant silence still; No sign of spring, save that the catkins fill,
O winter! frozen pulse and heart of fire, What loss is theirs who from thy kingdom turn Dismayed, and think thy snow a sculptured urn
Some flowers are withered and some joys have died; The garden reeks with an East Indian scent From beds where gillyflowers stand weak and spent;
O month whose promise and fulfilment blend, And burst in one! it seems the earth can store In all her roomy house no treasure more;
Month which the warring ancients strangely styled The month of war,--as if in their fierce ways Were any month of peace!--in thy rough days
O month when they who love must love and wed! Were one to go to worlds where May is naught, And seek to tell the memories he had brought
This is the treacherous month when autumn days With summer's voice come bearing summer's gifts. Beguiled, the pale down-trodden aster lifts
The month of carnival of all the year, When Nature lets the wild earth go its way And spend whole seasons on a single day.
O golden month! How high thy gold is heaped! The yellow birch-leaves shine like bright coins strung On wands; the chestnut's yellow pennons tongue
I. To one who found us on a starless night, All helpless, groping in a dangerous way,
