Poems (Kennedy)/Wishing

by Sara Beaumont Kennedy

WISHING

ITS harvest time in country lanes.  I As golden as though Phrygia's king   Knee-deep had trod that way.  The bearded grain swings swooningly   Where hot-breathed zephyrs play.  Across the fields the reapers move,   Each scythe a flash of light,  While from some far-off covert calls   The mystic-voiced Bob White.     It's harvest time in the country,      I hear the sickles' swish,     And here I sit in the city      And wish, and wish, and wishThat————?

It's trouting time in country streams.  Where, full of rhythmic, running sounds,   The purling brook slips by  And wins from mossy rocks a song   The fish in ambush lie,  Or else they play at hiding seek   'Neath lilies white and cool  Where darts the silent dragon fly   Above some shadowed pool.     It's trouting time in the country,      I hear the splash of fish,     And here I sit in the city      And wish, and wish, and wishTHAT————!!