He is reminded of another day with her.

The hips were reddening on this rose,

Those haws were hung with fire,

That day we went this way that goes

Up hills of bough and brier.

This hooked thorn caught her gown and seemed

Imploring her to linger;

Upon her hair a sun-ray streamed

Like some baptizing finger.

This false-foxglove, so golden now

With yellow blooms like bangles,

Was fading then. But yonder bough,—

The sumach's plume entangles,—

Was like an Indian's painted face;

And, like a squaw, attended

That bush, in vague vermilion grace

With beads of berries splendid.

And here we turned to mount that hill,

Down which the wild brook tumbles;

And, like to-day, that day was still,

And soft winds swayed the umbles

Of these wild carrots lawny gray;

And there, deep-dappled o'er us,

An orchard stretched; and in our way

Dropped ripened fruit before us.

A muffled thud the pippin fell,

And at our feet rolled dusty;

A hornet clinging to its bell,

The pear lay bruised and rusty.

The smell of pulpy peach and plum,

From which the juice oozed yellow,

Around which bees made sleepy hum,

Filled warm the air and mellow.

And then we came where, many hued,

The wet wild-morning-glory

Hung its balloons in shadows dewed

For dawning's offertory.

With bush and bramble, far away,

Beneath us stretched the valley,

Cleft of one creek, as clear as day,

That bickered musically.

The brown, the bronze, the green, the red

Of weed and brier ran riot

To walls of woods, whose vistas led

To shadowy nooks of quiet.

Long waves of feathering golden-rod

Ran through the gray in patches;

As in a cloud the gold of God

Burns, that the sunset catches.

And there, above the blue hills, rolled,

Like some vast conflagration,

The sunset, flaming rose and gold,

We watched in exultation.

Then turning homeward, she and I

Went in love's sweet derangement —

How different now seem earth and sky,

Since this undreamed estrangement!