WINTER AND SUMMER
tr., Emma Frances Bevan, 1899
146 “The sky is dreary and rainy, And the wind makes a restless moan— And the yellow leaves drift and wander, And the songs and the summer are gone.” | Not so, for the gardens are glowing In summer beyond the sea, In the glory of songs and of flowers, Whilst here it is winter for thee. | And land after land wakes in sunshine, And the grass and the lilies upspring, And the children shout loud in the meadows, And madly the wild birds sing. | There is never an end of the summer, For round the great world it goes; There are somewhere the fields of narcissus, And somewhere the sweet red rose. | “Why can I not follow the summer, Far over the hills and the sea, And be always for ever and ever Wherever the summer may be?” | O child, there is summer for ever, Here under the wintry sky, Where the Lord is the light and the glory, And His lambs in His pastures lie. | When the snow and the wild sleet are driven Far over the lonely mere, There is summer beyond all the summers, Where Jesus the Lord is near. | |