  I Can freckled August,—drowsing warm and blond Beside a wheat-shock in the white-topped mead, In her hot hair the oxeyed daisies wound,— O bird of rain, lend aught but sleepy heed To thee? when no plumed weed, no feather'd seed Blows by her; and no ripple breaks the pond, That gleams like flint within its rim of grasses, Through which the dragon-fly forever passes Like splintered diamond. II Drouth weights the trees, and from the farm-house eaves The locust, pulse-beat of the summer day, Throbs; and the lane, that shambles under leaves Limp with the heat—a league of rutty way— Is lost in dust; and sultry scents of hay Breathe from the panting meadows heaped with sheaves— Now, now, O bird, what hint is there of rain, In thirsty heaven or on burning plain, That thy keen eye perceives? III But thou art right. Thou prophesiest true. For hardly hast thou ceased thy forecasting, When, up the western fierceness of scorched blue, Great water-carrier winds their buckets bring Brimming with freshness. How their dippers ring And flash and rumble! lavishing large dew On corn and forestland, that, streaming wet, Their hilly backs against the downpour set, Like giants, loom in view. IV The butterfly, safe under leaf and flower, Has found a roof, knowing how true thou art; The bumblebee, within the last half-hour, Has ceased to hug the honey to its heart; While in the barnyard, under shed and cart, Brood-hens have housed.—But I, who scorned thy power, Barometer of the birds,—like August there,— Beneath a beech, dripping from foot to hair, Like some drenched truant, cower. |
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