Iv

The skies are amber, blue, and green Before the coming of the sun; And all the deep hills sleep, serene As if enchanted; every one Is ribbed with morning mists that lean On woods through which vague whispers run.

Birds wake: and on the vine-hung knobs, Above the brook, a twittering Confuses songs; one warbler robs Another of its note; a wing Beats by; and now a wild throat throbs Triumphant; all the woodlands sing.

The sun is up: the hills are heaped With instant splendor; and the vales Surprised with shimmers that are steeped In purple where the thin mist trails; The water-fall, the rock it leaped, Are burning gold that foams and fails.

He drives his horses to the plow Along the vineyard slopes, where bask Dew-heavy grapes, half-ripened now, In sun-shot shafts of shade: no mask Of joy he wears; his face and brow Glow as he enters on his task.

Before him, soaring through the mist, The gray hawk wildly wings and screams; Its dewy back gleams, sunbeam-kissed, Above the wood that drips and dreams; He guides the plow with one strong fist; The soil rolls back in level seams.

Packed to the right the sassafras Lifts leafy walls of spice that shade The blackberries, whose tendrils mass Big berries in the coolness made; And drop their ripeness on the grass Where trumpet-flowers fall and fade.

White on the left the fence and trees That mark the garden; and the smoke, Uncurling in the early breeze, Tells of the roof beneath the oak; He turns his team, and, turning, sees The damp, dark soil his coulter broke.

Bees hum; and o’er the berries poise Lean-bodied wasps; loud blackbirds turn Following the plow: there is a noise Of insect wings that buzz and burn;-- And now he hears his wife’s low voice, The song she sings to help her churn.