It is so quiet here. There lies The heath in noon's warm sunshine gold. A gleam of light, all rosy, flies And hovers round the tombstones old. The herbs are blooming; fragrance fair Now fills the bluish summer air. The beetles rush through bush and trees, In little golden coats of mail; And on the heather-bells the bees Alight, on all the branches frail. From out the grass there starts a throng Of larks and fills the air with song. A lonely house, half-crumbled, low: The farmer, in the doorway bent, Stands watching in the sunlight's glow The busy bees in sweet content. And on a stone near by his boy Is carving pipes from reeds with joy. Searce trembling through the peace of noon, The town-clock strikes--from far, it seems. The old man's lids are drooping soon, And of his honey crops he dreams.-- The sounds that fill our time of stress Have not yet reached this loneliness. |