DEAD LEAVES

As though a gipsy maiden with dim look,

Sat crooning by the roadside of the year,

So, Autumn, in thy strangeness, thou art here

To read dark fortunes for us from the book

Of fate; thou flingest in the crinkled brook

The trembling maple's gold, and frosty-clear

Thy mocking laughter thrills the atmosphere,

And drifting on its current calls the rook

To other lands. As one who wades, alone,

Deep in the dusk, and hears the minor talk

Of distant melody, and finds the tone,

In some wierd way compelling him to stalk

The paths of childhood over,— so I moan,

And like a troubled sleeper, groping, walk.