University of Virginia Library


180

SUMMER MOONS AT MOUNT VERNON

Such musky smell of maiden night!
Such bridal bough, like orange tree!
Such wondrous stars! Yon lily moon
Seems like some long-lost afternoon!
More perfect than a string of pearls
We hold the full days of the year;
The days troop by like flower girls,
And all the days are ours here.
Here youth must learn; here age may live
Full tide each day the year can give.
No frosted wall, no frozen hasp,
Shuts Nature's book from us today;
Her palm leaves lift too high to clasp;
Her college walls, the milky way.
The light is with us! Read and lead!
The larger book, the loftier deed!