Choice Specimens of American Literature, and Literary Reader · Chapter 338=418.= "may Noon."
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The farmer tireth of his half-day toil, He pauseth at the plough, He gazeth o'er the furrow-lined soil, Brown hand above his brow.
He hears, like winds lone muffled 'mong the hills, The lazy river run; From shade of covert woods, the eager rills Bound forth into the sun.
The clustered clouds of snowy apple-blooms, Scarce shivered by a breeze, With odor faint, like flowers in feverish rooms, Fall, flake by flake, in peace.
'Tis labor's ebb; a hush of gentle joy, For man, and beast, and bird; The quavering songster ceases its employ; The aspen is not stirred.
But Nature hath no pause; she toileth still; Above the last-year leaves Thrusts the lithe germ, and o'er the terraced hill A fresher carpet weaves.
From many veins she sends her gathered streams To the huge-billowed main, Then through the air, impalpable as dreams, She calls them back again.
She shakes the dew from her ambrosial locks, She pours adown the steep The thundering waters; in her palm, she rocks The flower-throned bee to sleep.
Smile in the tempest, faint and fragile man, And tremble in the calm! God plainest shows what great. Jehovah can, In these fair days of balm.
[Footnote 94: A native of Connecticut, but has lived for many years in the West, and latterly in Minnesota.]
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=Elijah E. Edwards,[95] 1831-.=