Three Days From Midsummer Day*

[jsburbidge]

Soon will the high Midsummer pomps come on,

Soon will the musk carnations break and swell,

Soon shall we have gold-dusted snapdragon,

Sweet-William with his homely cottage-smell,

And stocks in fragrant blow;

Roses that down the alleys shine afar,

And open, jasmine-muffled lattices,

And groups under the dreaming garden-trees,

And the full moon, and the white evening-star.

-- Matthew Arnold, Thyrsis

*Traditionally St. John's Day, which was the solstice in the Julian calendar (from about 400 to 800),and always notionally the solstice