S16E6: "Summer" by Christina Rossetti

Welcome to the final episode in Season 16 of The Well Read Poem podcast! Since summer is upon us, we thought it right to present six poems written on one subject or another in some way inspired by the present season. These works are of a diversity of hands, times, and moods, and we hope that they will add something pleasant to your reading life as the days and nights grow warmer.

Today's poem is "Summer" by Christina Rossetti. Poem reading begins at timestamp 3:06 or 6:44.

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Summer

by Christina Rossetti

Winter is cold-hearted,
  Spring is yea and nay,
Autumn is a weathercock
  Blown every way:
Summer days for me
  When every leaf is on its tree;

When Robin's not a beggar,
  And Jenny Wren's a bride,
And larks hang singing, singing, singing,
  Over the wheat-fields wide,
  And anchored lilies ride,
And the pendulum spider
  Swings from side to side,

And blue-black beetles transact business,
  And gnats fly in a host,
And furry caterpillars hasten
  That no time be lost,
And moths grow fat and thrive,
And ladybirds arrive.

Before green apples blush,
  Before green nuts embrown,
Why, one day in the country
  Is worth a month in town;
  Is worth a day and a year
Of the dusty, musty, lag-last fashion
  That days drone elsewhere.