Summer in the South

Paul Laurence Dunbar

The Oriole sings in the greening grove
As if he were half-way waiting,
The rosebuds peep from their hoods of green,
Timid, and hesitating.
The rain comes down in a torrent sweep
And the nights smell warm and piney,
The garden thrives, but the tender shoots
Are yellow-green and tiny.
Then a flash of sun on a waiting hill,
Streams laugh that erst were quiet,
The sky smiles down with a dazzling blue
And the woods run mad with riot.

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TEXT PROVENANCE · Text reference: Academy of American Poets, Poem-a-Day, June 22, 2013. The site retains “Oriole” and “Timid, and hesitating”; the reference has “oriole” and “Timid and hesitating”. Both read “piney”, unlike PoetryDB’s “pinety”. The September 1903 Lippincott’s printing has not been checked against a scan; no direct-original transcription is claimed.

Academy of American Poets, “Summer in the South” (Poem-a-Day, June 22, 2013)

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