Summer Fruits

δενδρέων δὲ νομὸν Διόνυσος πολυγαθὴς
αὐξάνοι, ἁγνὸν φέγγος ὀπώρας.

May Dionysus joy-bringer swell the trees
with fruit, the pure light of the serotinal season.

Pindar. Fragment 153. My translation.

Notes:
ὀπώρα, the season between the rise of Sirius and the rise of of Arcturus ends tonight.

Small Pond

《小池》 楊萬里

泉眼無聲惜細流，
樹陰照水愛晴柔。
小荷才露尖尖角，
早有蜻蜓立上頭。

‘Small Pond’
Yang Wanli (1127-1206)

Springs quietly and sparingly trickle out.
Tree shades dangle on water white and soft.
No sooner had the young lotus shot sprouts
Than the dragonflies alighted on their tops.

Translated by Qin Dachuan.

Long-awaited Summer

Aestas ab exilio
redit exoptata,
picto ridet gremio
tellus purpurata.
Miti cum susurrio
suo domicilio
gryllus delectatur.
Hoc canore iubilo,
multiformi sibilo
nemus gloriatur.

Long-awaited summer has come from exile, the violaceous earth smiles in her painted lap. The cricket, in his home, amuses himself with a soothing whisper. With this melodious song, with this multi-voiced hissing, the forest rejoices.

Carmina Burana 74.31-40. My translation.

The Countryside in Summer

Laurentius Corvinus (1465-1527)
'Hortatur studentes, ut rura aliquando petant.'

Auricomus medium dum scandit Phebus ad axem,
   Et canis estivos efflat ab ore dies.
In nemus ire iuvat densaque iacere sub alno,
   Raucus arenosa qua sonat amnis aqua;
Quaque salutiferos exalat floris odores
   Vernus et aprico gramine ridet ager.
Florigera eliciunt sopitam rura Minervam,
   Sublevat ingenium pingue susurrus aque.
Rure fatigati revocant sua robora sensus,
   Et capiunt vires languida membra novas.

'Students are encouraged to travel to the countryside while they still have the time'

Golden-braided Apollo climbs ascends to the middle of the pole,
   and Sirius breathes out the summer days from his lips.
It is pleasant to enter the woods and repose under a shady alder tree,
   where the raucous river resounds on the sandy water;
Where the vernal field exhales the flower's health-giving fragrances
   And rejoices in the sun-drenched grass.
Flowering fields solicit sleepy Minerva,
   The whispers of water stimulate their fertile nature.
In the countryside, exhausted minds regain their vigour,
   And tired limbs seize new strengths.

Notes:
Laurentius Corvinus, Carminum structura ([Leipzig: Martin Landsberg, 1496]), p. [20]. My translation. emend. 1 scandet.
 
This poem is attributed to Bohuslaw Lobkowitz von Hassenstein in his Opera poetica, ed. by Marta Vaculínová (Munich: Saur, 2006), p. 249. It is more likely that Corvinus is the true author, as he published it in as his own work in 1496. The misattribution is easy to explain as a consequence of the circulation of such small poems in manuscript.

An alternate version of this poem with six addition lines (incipit: "Rura iuvant homines...") can be found in Moritz Seyffert, Text zu den Materialen der Palaestra musarum (Halle: Verlag der Buchhandlung des Waisenhauses, 1834), I, p. 142.