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 wish
That————?

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 wish
THAT————!!