Читать книгу Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two - Various - Страница 4

Like liquid gold the wheat field lies,

A marvel of yellow and russet and green,

That ripples and runs, that floats and flies,

With the subtle shadows, the change, the sheen,

That play in the golden hair of a girl,—

A ripple of amber—a flare

Of light sweeping after—a curl

In the hollows like swirling feet

Of fairy waltzers, the colors run

To the western sun

Through the deeps of the ripening wheat.

Broad as the fleckless, soaring sky,

Mysterious, fair as the moon-led sea,

The vast plain flames on the dazzled eye

Under the fierce sun's alchemy.

The slow hawk stoops

To his prey in the deeps;

The sunflower droops

To the lazy wave; the wind sleeps—

Then swirling in dazzling links and loops,

A riot of shadow and shine,

A glory of olive and amber and wine,

To the westering sun the colors run

Through the deeps of the ripening wheat.

O glorious land! My western land,

Outspread beneath the setting sun!

Once more amid your swells, I stand,

And cross your sod-lands dry and dun.

I hear the jocund calls of men

Who sweep amid the ripened grain

With swift, stern reapers; once again

The evening splendor floods the plain,

The crickets' chime

Makes pauseless rhyme,

And toward the sun,

The colors run

Before the wind's feet

In the wheat!