Ballade of Midsummer Days and Nights
(Double refrain.)
With a ripple of leaves and a tinkle of streams
The full world rolls in a rhythm of praise,
And the winds are one with the clouds and beams-
Midsummer days! midsummer days!
The dusk grows vast; in a purple haze,
While the West from a rapture of sunset rights,
Faint stars their exquisite lamps upraise-
Midsummer nights! O midsummer nights!
The wood’s green heart is a nest of dreams,
The lush grass thickens and springs and sways,
The rathe wheat rustles, the landscape gleams-
Midsummer days! midsummer days!
In the stilly fields, in the stilly ways,
All secret shadows and mystic lights,
Late lovers murmurous linger and gaze-
Midsummer nights! O midsummer nights!
There’s a music of bells from the trampling teams,
Wild skylarks hover, the gorses blaze,
The rich, ripe rose as with incense steams—
Midsummer days! midsummer days!
A soul from the honeysuckle strays,
And the nightingale as from prophet heights,
Sings to the Earth of her million Mays-
Midsummer nights! O midsummer nights!
Envoy.
And its O! for my dear and the charm that stays-
Midsummer days! midsummer days!
Its O! for my Love and the dark that plights-
Midsummer nights! O midsummer nights!
W. E. Henley.