Beautiful Summer

artwork by Robert Duncan

Summer Evening

"Crows crowd croaking overhead,
Hastening to the woods to bed.
Cooing sits the lonely dove,
Calling home her absent love.
With 'Kirchup! Kirchup!' mong the wheats
Partridge distant partridge greets.

Flowers now sleep within their hoods;
Daisies button into buds;
From soiling dew the butter cup
Shuts his golden jewels up;
And the rose and woodbine they
Wait again the smile of day."

John Clare