A Protest

This is the sabbath season of the year,

When summer silence falleth on the earth, —

When truce hath come to husbandry and mirth,

To mower's scythe and wanton wood-notes clear.

The world is still, as if with holy fear,

And from its heart, through lily-bell and rose,

A stream of incense rises up, and flows

God wards with soft repinings for his ear.

And I would with the sabbath world take rest,

Could breathe my life out with the summer's sigh;

Could lay it at God's feet if, dispossest,

My soul might feed new life as glad as high;

But of no dweller on this earth unblest, —

This fair, lost world, where mortals love and die!