This is the voice of high midsummer's heat. The rasping vibrant clamour soars and shrills O'er all the meadowy range of shadeless hills, As if a host of giant cicadae beat The cymbals of their wings with tireless feet, Or brazen grasshoppers with triumphing note From the long swath proclaimed the fate that smote The clover and timothy-tops and meadowsweet. The crying knives glide on; the green swath lies. And all noon long the sun, with chemic ray, Seals up each cordial essence in its cell, That in the dusky stalls, some winter's day, The spirit of June, here prisoned by his spell, May cheer the herds with pasture memories. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE HOMERIC HEXAMETER [DESCRIBED AND EXEMPLIFIED] by SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE TRULY GREAT by WILLIAM HENRY DAVIES IN THE NEOLITHIC AGE by RUDYARD KIPLING HAVE YOU PLANTED A TREE? by HENRY ABBEY THE COWARD by LAWRENCE ALMA-TADEMA GREEN AISLES by WILLIAM ROSE BENET TANNHAUSER; OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON |