Mother Nature’s Spa Day

“…
For lying broad awake, long ere the dawn,
Staring against the dark, the blank of space
Opens immeasurably, and thy face
Wavers and glimmers there and is withdrawn.
And many days, when all one’s works is vain,
And life goes stretching on, a waste gray plain,
With even the short mirage of morning gone,
No cool breath anywhere, no shadow nigh
Where a weary man might lay him down and die,

Lo! Thou are there before me suddenly
With shade as if a summer cloud did pass,
And spray of fountains whispering to the grass.
Oh, save me from the haste and noise and heat
That spoil life’s music sweet:
And from that lesser Aphrodite there –
Even now she stands
Close as I turn, and O my soul, how fair!”
- E. R. Sill, Venus of Milo