Love-in-Idleness
A time for everything? O yes,
And August is the time, I guess,
To gather Love-in-idleness.
Am I not right? Fair one, confess!
Where shall we find it? Everywhere;
It floats upon the sultry air,
It glows through all the garden fair,
Tangles our feet in rosy snare.
How shall we know it? O most sweet,
Thou'lt know it by thy pulses' beat,
Thou'lt know it by the fragrance fleet
What time its flower and fading meet.
It fades so soon? Is not that best?
It dies ere use has dimmed its zest,
It dies in all its grace confessed,
Its hour of glory is its rest.
Hail, August monarch! Lo thy slaves bow down
And weave of Love-in-Idleness thy crown.
~~
Jane G. Austin (1831-1894)
from Through the Year with the Poets: August, 1886
[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]
Bob Collowan, A tub of love-in-idleness (viola tricolor)
[detail], 2013. CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons.
No comments:
Post a Comment