Ode To Autumn

Thou sombre lady of down-bended head,

And weary lashes drooping to the cheek,

With sweet sad fold of lips uncomforted,

And listless hands more tired with strife than meek ;

Turn here thy soft brown feet, and to my heart,

Unmatched to Summer's golden minstrelsy,

Or Spring's shrill pipe of joy, sing once again

        Sad songs, and I to thee

Well tuned, will answer that according part

That jarred with those young seasons' gladder strain.

Give me thy empty branches for the biers

Of perished joys, thy winds to sigh my sighs,

Thy falling leaves to count my falling tears,

And all thy mists to dim my aching eyes.

There is no comfort in thy lips, and none

In thy cold arms, nor pity in thy breast,

But better 'tis in gray hours to have grief,

        Than to affront the sun

With sunless woe, when every flower and leaf

Conspires to make the season merriest.

The drip of rain-drops on the sodden earth,

The trampled mud-stained grass, the shifting leaves,

The silent hurrying birds, the sickly birth

Of the red sun in misty skies, the sheaves

Of rotting ruined corn, the sudden gusts

Of angry winds, the clouds that fly all night

Before the stormy moon, thy desolate moans,

        All thy decays and rusts,

Thy deaths and dirges, these are tuned aright

To my unquiet soul that sorrow owns.

But ah ! thy gentler mood, the honeyed kiss

Of thy faint watery sunshine, thy pale gold,

Thy dark red berries, and the ambergris

That paints the lingering leaves, while on the mould,

Their dead make bronze and sepia carpetings

That lightly rustle in thy quiet breath.

These are the shadows of departed smiles,

        The ghosts of happy things ;

These break again the broken heart, the whiles

Thou goest onto winter, I to Death.