Scottish Poetry XIX

O, Summer Day
by Alexander Anderson

Summer day, pour down your love,
That I may idly lie
And watch the happy clouds that move—
The Mercuries of the sky;

Who, sent by God on some sweet task,
Will loiter on their way,
As if they gently paused to ask
His sanction to their stay.

I hear the birds—I see the flowers
From their cool places peep,
And odorous as the purple hours
That hush the sun asleep.

I hear each breathing of the wind,
Each whisper of the tree,
That, taller than its branchy kind,
Bows down and speaks to me.

A languor creeps throughout my blood,
Whose happy workings move
The heart to its sublimest mood
Of all-embracing love.

I feel no idle purpose roll
Its restless freak in me;
But one vast wish to shoot my soul
Through everything I see,

And be a part of this sweet light
That warms the breathing day;
To sink from aught of mortal sight,
And dream myself from clay.