Harvest

Sweet, sweet, sweet,   Is the wind’s song, Astir in the rippled wheat   All day long. It hath the brook’s wild gayety, The sorrowful cry of the sea.   Oh hush and hear!   Sweet, sweet and clear,   Above the locust’s whirr   And hum of bee Rises that soft, pathetic harmony. In the meadow-grass   The innocent white daisies blow, The dandelion plume doth pass   Vaguely to and fro,— The unquiet spirit of a flower That hath too brief an hour. Now doth a little cloud all white,     Or golden bright, Drift down the warm, blue sky;   And now on the horizon line, Where dusky woodlands lie,   A sunny mist doth shine, Like to a veil before a holy shrine,   Concealing, half-revealing     Things Divine. Sweet, sweet, sweet,   Is the wind’s song, Astir in the rippled wheat   All day long. That exquisite music calls   The reaper everywhere—   Life and death must share, The golden harvest falls. So doth all end,—   Honored Philosophy,   Science and Art,   The bloom of the heart;— Master, Consoler, Friend,   Make Thou the harvest of our days   To fall within Thy ways.