Text: Han­na-Ma­ria Jur­mu

Trans­la­ti­on: Sirk­ka-Lii­sa Lei­no­nen

Thank you for ha­ving come, sum­mer. You, sum­mer, are sheer light, light, light. You give growth even at ti­mes of drought. You give us all that we need to sur­vi­ve un­til you come back again. Thank you, sum­mer, for ha­ving come.

Dear He­a­ven­ly Fat­her, thank you for the sum­mer. All things are yo­ur gifts.

Sum­mer, you ap­pe­ar dif­fe­rent to dif­fe­rent pe­op­le. To some you seem just right and per­fect. To some ot­hers you bring an­xie­ty and bur­dens. Why, oh, why can the most be­au­ti­ful thing be the ug­liest? How can the best be the worst?

Dear God, you give us all things. Give strength to those who are ti­red.

Sum­mer, ver­dant and eart­hy, cold with nort­her­ly winds. You ope­ned yo­ur bo­som to re­le­a­se a flur­ry of hails that dest­ro­yed the flo­wers on my sis­ter’s ap­p­le trees. They got four ap­p­les. Sum­mer, you al­so ope­ned yo­ur bo­som to re­le­a­se inc­re­dib­le light and hu­mi­di­ty, which hel­ped my mot­her’s ap­p­le tree pro­du­ce more ap­p­les than ever be­fo­re.

You are the Lord of ele­ments and we­at­her.

Sum­mer, you gave me a new hob­by and a new friend. I have ne­ver known that the ri­ver, the ri­ver banks, the dis­tant fields shim­me­ring in sha­des of green, the fo­rests and the clouds in the sky are dif­fe­rent eve­ry day. I have not known one does not get ti­red swim­ming, on­ly a bit cold oc­ca­si­o­nal­ly. I have not known how lo­ve­ly it is to swim with my ey­es clo­sed, or how I can bring my ey­es down to the wa­ter le­vel, so that the wa­ter seems like part of me or like an end­less, spark­ling blue car­pet.

How won­der­ful it is to come up from the wa­ter for a while, to sit on the rocks and eat wild cur­rants and rasp­ber­ries, to le­arn that white cur­rants ri­pen stran­ge­ly slow­ly. How won­der­ful it is to al­re­a­dy wait for a new sum­mer. Though you have not gone away yet, my sum­mer!

I have le­arnt there is a thing cal­led swim­mer’s float. It is a good mate. I can trust it. It flo­ats be­hind me qui­et­ly and on­ly tries to get ahe­ad of me when the wa­ves are big. It lis­tens to our end­less chat­ter but is qui­et and ne­ver sha­res with any­bo­dy the things it has he­ard.

When we are done swim­ming, we sit on the deck, drin­king black cur­rant jui­ce and ea­ting car­rots. Wasn’t it won­der­ful again, we say a mil­li­on ti­mes. See you to­mor­row at five, we say when we le­a­ve.

Sum­mer, were you full of ex­pec­ta­ti­ons again? Do you have to lis­ten to di­sap­poin­ted com­ments about work that did not get done? Why do­esn’t anyt­hing chan­ge? Why don’t I chan­ge?

Dear God, help us be con­tent with what we ac­hie­ve.

Where will you go, sum­mer, when the fall co­mes? Will you go to a place where all the past things in God’s world are li­ned up in a good or­der? Will you go to a place where my thoughts can re­ach you and where I can find you and talk to you? Is that the place where me­mo­ries are made gol­den and be­au­ti­ful, more be­au­ti­ful than re­a­li­ty?

Did you go away al­re­a­dy, my sum­mer?