Coming-of-Age on a Wisconsin Farm, 1860s

Coming-of-Age on a Wisconsin Farm, 1860s

Month by month,   the universe in which I lived

lightened     and       widened 

-- Hamlin Garland, A Son of the Middle Border (1917)

Summer Solstice, 2019

The sun at apogee, an empire all of light.

The sweet corn basks and ripens in its rays.

All memory of winter  has melted from our minds.

Yet even now the worm lies in the bud, one day to blast it.

The long limbs of daylight   that had stretched and stretched

now imperceptibly  begin to shrink:

even as the cosmos  attains its outmost limit,

and sighs back  to collapse.

Alas, the Elves of Ice  lurk still in northern forests,

plotting their return.