Longing for Texas

No, it isn't hot in Texas; and the cool night-dews are falling,

      And the katydids are chirping in the grass beside the pool,

And from out the moonlit distances the mockingbirds are calling,

      And I know the days are hazy and the nights perfumed

            and cool.

And I know the jasmine's blooming as it bloomed in all its

            whiteness,

      And my heart is heavy in me, for I'm far away today;

And my spirit lags forever and my tread has lost its lightness,

      And I'm humming .'Down in Dixie,'. and my heart throbs

      “Look away !"

No, it isn't hot in Texas, for the cool Gulf breeze is blowing,

      And the cattle there are standing underneath the liveoak trees,

Or are wending ~lowly homeward from the pasture, lowing,

            lowing,

      And a drone comes softly to me from the honey-laden bees.

And I'm longing, longing, longing, for the day of my home-

            coming,

      For the lowing of the cattle and the shadows on the stream;

For the mockingbirds' far calling and the laden bees' soft

            humming,

      And the night-dews falling coolly as the shadows in a dream.

Oh, the rolling, rolling prairies, and the grasses waving, waving,

      Like the billows 'neath the Gulf-breeze in the perfumed

            purple gloam!

Oh my heart is heavy in me and my soul is craving, craving,

      For the fertile plains and forests of my far-off Texas home.

Poems for Declamation Table of Content