One Summer Morning

IT is but a little while ago: The elm-leaves have scarcely begun to drop away; The sunbeams strike the elm-trunk just where they struck that day-- Yet all seems to have happened long ago. And the year rolleth round, slow, slow: Autumn will fade to winter and winter melt in spring, New life return again to every living thing. Soon, this will have happened long ago. The bonnie wee flowers will blow; The trees will re-clothe themselves, the birds sing out amain,-- But never, never, never will the world look again As it looked before this happened--long ago!