Moon over the Bog

Saturday evening was truly magical with the moon hanging big in the sky. With the smell of the earth cooling from the heat of the day and the sounds of the birds, full and happy, settling down for the night; a midsummer's evening is life at its very best.

Sunset Over the Bog

So perfect was the June evening as the sunset dripped into the bog, one could even forgive the mosquitoes their dinner.

Life's Summer Mood

In summer, when the days were long,

We walk’d, two friends, in field and wood;

Our heart was light, our step was strong,

And life lay round us, fair as good,

In summer, when the days were long.

We stray’d from morn till evening came,

We gather’d flowers, and wove us crowns;

We walk’d mid poppies red as flame,

Or sat upon the yellow downs,

And always wish’d our life the same.

In summer, when the days were long,

We leap’d the hedgerow, cross’d the brook;

And still her voice flow’d forth in song,

Or else she read some graceful book,

In summer, when the days were long.

And then we sat beneath the trees,

With shadows lessening in the noon;

And in the sunlight and the breeze

We revell’d, many a glorious June,

While larks were singing o’er the leas.

In summer, when the days were long,

We pluck’d wild strawberries, ripe and red,

Or feasted, with no grace but song,

On golden nectar, snow-white bread,

In summer, when the days were long.

We lov’d, and yet we knew it not,

For loving seem’d like breathing then;

We found a heaven in every spot;

Saw angels, too, in all good men,

And dream’d of gods in grove and grot.

In summer, when the days are long,

Alone I wander, muse alone;

I see her not, but that old song

Under the fragrant wind is blown,

In summer, when the days are long.

Alone I wander in the wood,

But one fair spirit hears my sighs;

And half I see the crimson hood,

The radiant hair, the calm glad eyes,

That charm’d me in life’s summer mood. 

In summer, when the days are long,

I love her as I lov’d of old;

My heart is light, my step is strong,

For love brings back those hours of gold,

In summer, when the days are long.

Summer Days by Wathen Marks Wilks Call 

Summer Dreaming...

The last day of January is brutally cold and snowy, bringing dreams of summer flowers and dew dripping through green leaves.

Indian Blanket for Cooler Days Ahead

Summer's last hurrah very often includes an Indian Blanket or two, as if we need a little something to help us through the transition from Summer to Fall.

This lone flower was like a beacon soaking up the late afternoon sunshine---a wildflower full of warmth.    

Summer Fades. Joys Spoilt in Use. Bring on the Fall.

Ever let the fancy roam,

Pleasure never is at home:

At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,

Like to bubbles when rain pelteth;

Then let winged Fancy wander

Through the thought still spread beyond her:

Open wide the mind’s cage-door,

She’ll dart forth, and cloudward soar.

O sweet Fancy! let her loose;

Summer’s joys are spoilt by use,

And the enjoying of the Spring

Fades as does its blossoming;

Autumn’s red-lipp’d fruitage too,

Blushing through the mist and dew,

Cloys with tasting: What do then?

Sit thee by the ingle, when

The sear faggot blazes bright,

Spirit of a winter’s night;

When the soundless earth is muffled,

And the caked snow is shuffled

From the ploughboy’s heavy shoon;

When the Night doth meet the Noon 

In a dark conspiracy

To banish Even from her sky.

Sit thee there, and send abroad,

With a mind self-overaw’d,

Fancy, high-commission’d:—send her!

She has vassals to attend her:

She will bring, in spite of frost,

Beauties that the earth hath lost;

She will bring thee, all together,

All delights of summer weather;...

John Keats/Fancy

Deer Dreaming of the Morn

SHERWOOD in the twilight, is Robin Hood awake?

Grey and ghostly shadows are gliding through the brake;

Shadows of the dappled deer, dreaming of the morn,

Dreaming of a shadowy man that winds a shadowy horn.

Robin Hood is here again: all his merry thieves

Hear a ghostly bugle-note shivering through the leaves,

Calling as he used to call, faint and far away,

In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

Merry, merry England has kissed the lips of June:

All the wings of fairyland were here beneath the moon;

Like a flight of rose-leaves fluttering in a mist

Of opal and ruby and pearl and amethyst.

Merry, merry England is waking as of old,

With eyes of blither hazel and hair of brighter gold:

For Robin Hood is here again beneath the bursting spray

In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

Love is in the greenwood building him a house

Of wild rose and hawthorn and honeysuckle boughs;

Love it in the greenwood: dawn is in the skies;

And Marian is waiting with a glory in her eyes.

Hark! The dazzled laverock climbs the golden steep:

Marian is waiting: is Robin Hood asleep?

Round the fairy grass-rings frolic elf and fay,

In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

Oberon, Oberon, rake away the gold,

Rake away the red leaves, roll away the mould,

Rake away the gold leaves, roll away the red,

And wake Will Scarlett from his leafy forest bed.

Friar Tuck and Little John are riding down together

With quarter-staff and drinking-can and grey goose-feather;

The dead are coming back again; the years are rolled away

In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

Softly over Sherwood the south wind blows;

All the heart of England hid in every rose

Hears across the greenwood the sunny whisper leap,

Sherwood in the red dawn, is Robin Hood asleep?

Hark, the voice of England wakes him as of old

And, shattering the silence with a cry of brighter gold,

Bugles in the greenwood echo from the steep,

Sherwood in the red dawn, is Robin Hood asleep?

Where the deer are gliding down the shadowy glen

All across the glades of fern he calls his merry men;

Doublets of the Lincoln green glancing through the May,

In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day;

Calls them and they answer: from aisles of oak and ash

Rings the Follow! Follow! and the boughs begin to crash;

The ferns begin to flutter and the flowers begin to fly;

And through the crimson dawning the robber band goes by.

Robin! Robin! Robin! All his merry thieves

Answer as the bugle-note shivers through the leaves:

Calling as he used to call, faint and far away,

In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

By Alfred Noyes---Sherwood 

An Unexpected Heaven Came...

A SOMETHING in a summer’s day,

As slow her flambeaux burn away,

Which solemnizes me.

A something in a summer’s noon,—

An azure depth, a wordless tune,

Transcending ecstasy.

And still within a summer’s night

A something so transporting bright,

I clap my hands to see;

Then veil my too inspecting face,

Lest such a subtle, shimmering grace

Flutter too far for me.

The wizard-fingers never rest,

The purple brook within the breast

Still chafes its narrow bed;

  

Still rears the East her amber flag,

Guides still the sun along the crag

His caravan of red,

Like flowers that heard the tale of dews,

But never deemed the dripping prize

Awaited their low brows;

Or bees, that thought the summer’s name

Some rumor of delirium

No summer could for them;

Or Arctic creature, dimly stirred

By tropic hint,—some travelled bird

Imported to the wood;

Or wind’s bright signal to the ear,

Making that homely and severe,

Contented, known, before

The heaven unexpected came,

To lives that thought their worshipping

A too presumptuous psalm.

Nature Part Two by Emily Dickinson

Late Summer Reflections

Late summer is reflected in a bayou of the Kankakee River. This area is full of small fish and wildlife.