O Summertime!

What if Summertime was rewritten in a Spenserian Stanza?





O Summertime, with easy living there,
   The fish are jumping and the cotton high
   Your mom is pretty and your dad has flare
   So hush now, baby, don't you raise a cry.
   Now soon you'll rise up, spread your wings and fly.
   But till that morning when we stand by you,
   Then spread your wings and rise from earth to sky!
   And there is nothing that can e'er break through!
This Summertime, a portal and a door unto!

- D. Benning

I Sing of Autumn

I sing of Autumn and her sister Fall:
   As days grow short and Summer speeds away,
   And captures dying leaves against the wall,
   She comes most gently, bit by bit each day
   Till Summer's languid hold and heat decay.
   Then banners flung, unfurled against the sky,
   Bedecked in colors, sights, and sounds, display
   The passing of fair Summer's long "Good-bye"—
A glorious emblem heralding Winter's battle cry!

- D. Benning

O Autumn, Come!

O Autumn, come and quench the heat of day,
The stifling blaze of Summer's austere eye.
She came with joy and merriment away
With leafy green and promised blue of sky.
But Days grew long and hot and choked with dust
And smoke!  Her promised fruit can't satisfy.

The fickle winds, the soot and parched earth crust,
The shrinking lakes in sun-baked lands and hills,
The tattered leaves, most faded brown and rust,
All long for Autumn's winds and cooling thrills!
Set air to crisp; enliven hearts and minds!
Bring rain and brisk with frosty nighttime chills!

With colored leaves and freshness all entwined,
She paints her joyful masterpiece unsigned.

     D. Benning

O Summertime!

Knaresborough England, Sherry Lynn

O Summertime, with warm embrace,
  Enchanted time with leafy lace,
Whose squeeze of heat makes days grow long,
  Whose nights are warm and filled with song,
Yes, your embrace which long held sway,
  Infused each bloom and flow'ry spray,
Has now grown weak and trending frail;
  Your short'ning days with colors pale.
You grasp at time but days rush past,
  Leaves tired of life soon brown are massed.
Yet vainly you would try to stall,
  The coming footsteps of the Fall
Or Autumn with her captive hue—
  When with one blow your works shall strew.
O Summer, you must give way soon,
  And Nature shall to Fall atune!

- D. Benning

Tree Lover's Collection, Sherry Lynn