What will the summer bring?
Sunshine and flowers,
Brightness and melody,
Golden-voiced hours;
Rose-gleaming mornings.
Vocal with praise;
Crimson-flush'd evenings,
Nightingale lays.

What may the summer bring?
Gladness and mirth,
Laughter and song,
For the children of earth;
Smiles for the old man,
Joy for the strong,
Glee for the little ones
All the day long.

What will the summer bring?
Coolness and shade,
Eloquent stillness
In thicket and glade;
Whispering breezes,
Fragrance oppress'd;
Lingering twilight
Soothing to rest.

What may the summer bring?
Freshness and calm
To the care-worn and troubled,
Beauty and balm.
O toil-weary spirit,
Best thee anew,
For the heat of the world-race
Summer hath dew!

What will the summer bring?
Sultry noon-hours,
Lurid horizons,
Frowning cloud-towers;
Loud-crashing thunders,
Tempest and hail,
Death-bearing lightnings,
It brings without fail.

What may the summer bring?
Dimness and woe,
Blackness of sorrow
Its bright days may know;
Flowers may be wormwood,
Verdure a pall,
The shadow of death
On the fairest may fall.

Is it not ever so?
Where shall we find
Light that may cast
No shadow behind?
Calm that no tempest
May darkly await?
Joy that no sorrow
May swiftly abate?

Will the story of summer
Be written in light,
Or traced in the darkness
Of storm-cloud and night?
We know not—we would not know;
Why should we quail?
Summer, we welcome thee!
Summer, all hail!

F. R. H