The Heart’s Summer

By Epes Sargent


THE COLD blast at the casement beats;
The window-panes are white;
The snow whirls through the empty streets;
It is a dreary night!
Sit down, old friend, the wine-cups wait;
Fill to o’erflowing, fill!
Though winter howleth at the gate,
In our hearts ’t is summer still!

For we full many summer joys
And greenwood sports have shared,
When, free and ever-roving boys,
The rocks, the streams, we dared;
And, as I looked upon thy face,
Back, back o’er years of ill,
My heart flies to that happy place,
Where it is summer still.

Yes, though like sere leaves on the ground,
Our early hopes are strown,
And cherished flowers lie dead around,
And singing birds are flown,
The verdure is not faded quite,
Not mute all tones that thrill;
And seeing, hearing thee to-night,
In my heart ’t is summer still.

Fill up! The olden times come back
With light and life once more;
We scan the Future’s sunny track
From Youth’s enchanted shore;
The lost return: through fields of bloom
We wander at our will;
Gone is the winter’s angry gloom,—
In our hearts ’t is summer still.