Past Summer

When first the summer-time seems gray and cold,
Though sad, we are not hopeless, for we say, —
"No summer yet has been all cold and gray;
Warm days shall come, e'en as they came of old;
Yea, days of bounteous sunlight shall enfold
The longing earth. In paths where now none stray
We yet shall wander, singing by the way;
And though the nightingale long since hath told

"Her tale to every green and wind-swept glen,
In sumptuous summer nights we shall repose
'Neath gold-touched leaves that have not lost their green.
But when the darkened summer finds its close, —
When we have had such days and nights, — 't is then
We know what may not be by what has been."