Page:Poems Cook.djvu/287

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SONG OF THE HAYMAKERS.
When music fills the shell no more,
"Twill be all crush'd and scatter'd;
And when this heart's wild tone is o'er,
"Twill be all cold and shatter'd.

Oh, vain will be the hope to break
Its last and dreamless slumbers;
When "Old Cries" come, and fail to wake
Its deep and fairy numbers!


SONG OF THE HAYMAKERS.
The noontide is hot and our foreheads are brown;
Our palms are all shining and hard;
Right close is our work with the wain and the fork,
And but poor is our daily reward.
But there's joy in the sunshine, and mirth in the lark
That skims whistling away over head;
Our spirits are light, though our skins may be dark,
And there's peace with our meal of brown bread.
We dwell in the meadows, we toil on the sward,
Far away from the city's dull gloom;
And more jolly are we, though in rags we may be,
Than the pale faces over the loom.
Then a song and a cheer for the bonnie green stack,
Climbing up to the sun wide and high;
For the pitchers, and rakers, and merry haymakers,
And the beautiful Midsummer sky!

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