summer

Rewarded now with summer calm,

Two lovers lie upon a Scottish hill

Beneath a sky that deepest blue

Bereft of limit to its end;

Oh, listen now, my dearest one

To all the things I’d wish for you:

A hundred lovely days like this,

A sun that lingers, hardly sets

And evenings that are barely dark,

The briefest pause before the dawn.

Behind them as he speaks these words,

The slow currents of the Sound of Mull

Move past the island’s shores;

There is so much to love in this country,

When it is like this, and is at peace,

When its crouching hills

Are the guardians of these hidden glens

Where heather and Scots pines

Remind us of evenings past

When the world was less a place of wrong,

When love, not distrust, was the key

In which the nations sang their song.

May soft winds blow about your head,

May sun caress your tender cheeks,

May tears of gentle rain then wash

The marks of fretful care away;

May you remember from this day

Good resolutions and great plans,

Our promises once made believed,

The sharing of our private hopes,

In letters that are signed with love,

With secret names, with pencilled signs.