Emily Pauline Johnson (1861–1913)

PILLOWED and hushed on the silent plain,

Wrapped in her mantle of golden grain,

Wearied of pleasuring weeks away,

Summer is lying asleep to-day,—

Where winds come sweet from the wild-rose briers

And the smoke of the far-off prairie fires.

Yellow her hair as the golden-rod,

And brown her cheeks as the prairie sod;

Purple her eyes as the mists that dream

At the edge of some laggard sun-drowned stream;

But over their depths the lashes sweep,

For Summer is lying to-day asleep.

The north wind kisses her rosy mouth,

His rival frowns in the far-off south,

And comes caressing her sunburnt cheek,

And Summer awakes for one short week,—

Awakes and gathers her wealth of grain,

Then sleeps and dreams for a year again.