THIS is the Sabbath season of the year,
When summer silence falleth on the earth—
When truce hath come to husbandry and mirth,
To mower's scythe and wanton wood-notes clear.
The world is still, as if with holy fear,
And from its heart, through lily-bell and rose,
A stream of incense rises up, and flows
Godward with soft repinings for His ear.

And I would with the Sabbath world take rest,
Could breathe my life out with the Summer's sigh,
Could lay it at God's feet if, dispossest,
My soul might feed new life as glad as high;
But of no vagrant of this earth unblest—
This fair, lost world, where mortals love and die!