The Poems of Lionel Johnson

Summer Storm

To Harold Child.

The wind, hark! the wind in the angry woods:
And low clouds purple the west: there broods
    Thunder, thunder; and rain will fall;
    Fresh fragrance cling to the wind from all
        Roses holding water wells,
    Laurels gleaming to the gusty air;
        Wilding mosses of the dells,
    Drenched hayfields, and dripping hedgerows fair.

The wind, hark! the wind dying again:
The wind’s voice matches the far-off main,
    In sighing cadences: Pan will wake,
    Pan in the forest, whose rich pipes make
        Music to the folding flowers,
    In the pure eve, where no hot spells are:
        Those be favourable hours
    Hymned by Pan beneath the shepherd star.

1887.