Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume V. Nature. 1904. | | | | III. The Seasons | | Before the Rain | | Thomas Bailey Aldrich (1836–1907) |
| | | WE knew it would rain, for all the morn | |
| A spirit on slender ropes of mist | |
| Was lowering its golden buckets down | |
| Into the vapory amethyst | |
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| Of marshes and swamps and dismal fens— | 5 |
| Scooping the dew that lay in the flowers, | |
| Dipping the jewels out of the sea, | |
| To scatter them over the land in showers. | |
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| We knew it would rain, for the poplars showed | |
| The white of their leaves, the amber grain | 10 |
| Shrunk in the wind—and the lightning now | |
| Is tangled in tremulous skeins of rain. | | | | |
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