Poetry: The Return

This summer is gorgeous, but over this weekend my mind kept going to this past winter. And so, this, by Ogden Nash. It runs like a jumprope rhyme (Trochees, that. And you thought that English Literature degree was for naught?) but the bittersweet comes out the more for it.

The year is half gone, and so is the summer. Are you making it matter?

The Return

Early is the evening,
Reluctant the dawn;
Once there was summer;
Sudden it was gone.
It fell like a leaf,
Whirled downstream.
Was there ever summer,
Or only a dream?
Was ever a world
That was not November?
Once there was summer,
And this I remember,

Cornflowers and daisies,
Buttercups and clover,
Black-eyed Susans, and Queen Anne’s lace,
A wide green meadow,
And the bees booming over,
And a little laughing girl with the wind in her face.

Strident are the voices
And hard lights shine;
Feral are the faces;
Is one of them mine?
Something is lost now;
Tarnished the gleam;
Was there ever nobleness,
Or only a dream?
Yes, and it lingers,
Lost not yet;
Something remains
Till this I forget,

Cornflowers and clover,
Buttercups and daisies,
Black-eyed Susans under blue and white skies;
And the grass waist-high
Where the red cow grazes,
And a little laughing girl with faith in her eyes.