Summer  Drouth

 The smoke from burning forests nips the nostrils and the eyes,

And showers of white leaf-ashes fall, like snow-flakes, from the skies.

The sun sinks red and sinister behind his opaque shade,

Yet never can we glimpse those burnished sunsets flame and fade.

So dusty are the roadways, and the leaves how early browned!

While the sense of suffocation is everywhere around.

We long for sun and shadow, drifting clouds and starry skies,

When, against the skyline's blueness, the ghost-like mountains rise:

In lieu of peevish children — and mother's sharp reproof —

We long to hear the rattle of the rain upon the roof!

 

Gordon Stace Smith