Edna St. Vincent Millay

 

When poppies in the garden

bleed,

And coreopsis goes to seed,

And pansies, blossoming past

their prime,

Grow small and smaller all the

time,

When on the mown field,

shrunk and dry,

Brown dock and purple thistle

lie,

And smoke from forest fires at

noon

Can make the sun appear the

moon,

When apple seeds, all white

before,

Begin to darken in the core,

I know that summer, scarcely

here,

Is gone until another year.