It’s all a farce, — these tales they tell About the breezes sighing, And moans astir o’er field and dell, Because the year is dying.

The milkweed pods are breaking, And the bits of silken down Float off upon the autumn breeze Across the meadows brown.

I cannot endure to waste anything as precious as autumn sunshine by staying in the house. So I spend almost all the daylight hours in the open air.

Under a blue cloud-ruffled sky, Dense trees along the banks, And a fellow with a red bandana Sitting in a small, green Flat-bottom boat Holding the thin whip of a pole.

Among the first we learn is good-bye, Your tiny wrist between Dad’s forefinger And thumb forced to wave bye-bye to Mom, Whose hand sails brightly behind a windshield.

Across the evening sky all the birds are leaving But how can they know it’s time for them to go? Before the winter fire, I will still be dreaming.

The year’s best blueberry scone Gorgeous needlework being shown Iron skillets being thrown We recall what has always made the Vineyard unique.

The paper lanterns rise, filled with golden fire, flaming specters devour our heaven sent desires.

I unclothed myself in silence, draped my flesh upon their flesh, released my dreams to run with theirs, in pairs our quiet clocks chimed in unison.

When the blackberries hang swollen in the woods, in the brambles nobody owns, I spend all day among the high branches.

In the dog days of summer as muslin curls on its own heat And crickets cry in the black walnut tree The wind lifts up my life And sets it some distance from where it was.

I walk without flinching through the burning cathedral of the summer My bank of wild grass is majestic and full of music.  It is a fire that solitude presses against my lips.

Between the dusk of a summer night And the dawn of a summer day, We caught at a mood as it passed in flight, And we bade it stoop and stay.

America! America! God shed his grace on thee And crown thy good with brotherhood From sea to shining sea!

I am coming! Hark! the honey bee is humming; See, the lark is soaring high In the blue and sunny sky, And the gnats are on the wing Wheeling round in airy ring.

That beautiful season the Summer! Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light; and the landscape Lay as if new created in all the freshness of childhood.

Great is the sun, and wide he goes Through empty heaven with repose; And in the blue and glowing days More thick than rain he showers his rays.

Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.

I, the Rock, I the River, I the Tree I am yours – your Passages have been paid. Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need For this bright morning dawning for you.

Few hearts like his, with virtue warm’d, Few heads with knowledge so inform’d; If there’s another world, he lives in bliss; If there is none, he made the best of this.