Poems (Ford)/Summer Showers

​

SUMMER SHOWERS.
The sun-scorched earth seems shrinking From the dense, heated air;The trees are lifting upward Their arms as if in prayer;In sickly languor drooping Are all the beauteous flowers,In silent supplication For sweet, refreshing showers.
The rustlings of the corn-leaves In silvery whispers pass;In quiet waves of verdure Lies the soft meadow grass; ​All nature seems to slumber In weariness and pain,Waiting to be awakened By the soft summer rain.
God hears this mute appealing, And, in His boundless love,He turns the crystal channels Of the bright streams above,And over field and forest The gleaming raindrops glance,While to the wind's low music Their twinkling footsteps dance.
And as in pearly clusters Descend the falling showers,Like tears of pitying angels, Upon the thirsty flowers,So does God's tender mercy Fall like refreshing rain,To bid the fainting spirit Rise, live and hope again.
Oh, universal Father, Beneath whose bounteous handEarth spreads her robe of beauty, And buds and flowers expand,Who arches earth and ocean With the clear heaven o'er, ​And strews the stars like diamonds Upon its azure floor,—
If in Thy love Thou sendest The gentle rain, to fallOn leaf and bud and blossom, Whose mute lips to Thee call,How much more wilt Thou succor Thy human flowers, placed hereTo gather strength and beauty For a sublimer sphere.

This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.