December Rain

DECEMBER RAIN

A dimness from great greyness

Lies in the rooms inside,

The blue-gray veil of showers

Sweeps over distances

With paleness far and wide

On hills and skylines now.

No summer sun is seen

Upon cloud-curtained sky.

High benefice of green,

The gift now given after

The long and shrinking dry

That cracked the hopeful earth

And turned the leaves to thirst,

Is smell of rain on breezes

And pattering on roofs.

The gift now given after

The longing for sky moisture

Is all this world now under

A cold wind in the summer.

I make no moral triteness

Upon this change of weather,

The bringing of sky water

For stem and root and flower,

And yet I can perceive

That after dryness now

The raindrop jewels on leaves

That catch white fire from cloud sky

Are surely like true beauty;

And drumming on the roof

Is beautiful like truth.