Summer Longings

Denis Florence Mac Carthy (1817–1882)

AH! my heart is weary waiting,

Waiting for the May,—

Waiting for the pleasant rambles

Where the fragrant hawthorn-brambles,

With the woodbine alternating,

Scent the dewy way.

Ah! my heart is weary waiting,

Waiting for the May.

Ah! my heart is sick with longing,

Longing for the May,—

Longing to escape from study

To the young face fair and ruddy,

And the thousand charms belonging

To the summer’s day.

Ah! my heart is sick with longing,

Longing for the May.

Ah! my heart is sore with sighing,

Sighing for the May,—

Sighing for their sure returning,

When the summer beams are burning,

Hopes and flowers that, dead or dying,

All the winter lay.

Ah! my heart is sore with sighing,

Sighing for the May.

Ah! my heart is pained with throbbing,

Throbbing for the May,—

Throbbing for the seaside billows,

Or the water-wooing willows;

Where, in laughing and in sobbing,

Glide the streams away.

Ah! my heart, my heart is throbbing,

Throbbing for the May.

Waiting sad, dejected, weary,

Waiting for the May:

Spring goes by with wasted warnings,—

Moonlit evenings, sunbright mornings,—

Summer comes, yet dark and dreary

Life still ebbs away;

Man is ever weary, weary,

Waiting for the May!