RETURN

Ah, it was here — September

And silence filled the air —

I came last year to remember,

And muse, hid away from care.

It was here I came — the thistle

Was trusting her seed to the wind;

The quail in the croft gave whistle

As now — and the fields lay thinned.

I know how the hay was steeping,

Brown mows under mellow haze;

How a frail cloud-flock was creeping

As now over lone sky-ways.

Just there where the catbird's calling

Her mock-hurt note by the shed,

The use-worn wain was stalling

In the weedy brook's dry bed.

And the cricket, lone little chimer

Of day-long dreams in the vines,

Chirred on like a doting rhymer

O'er-vain of his firstling lines.

He's near me now by the aster,

Beneath whose shadowy spray

A sultry bee seeps faster

As the sun slips down the day.

And there are the tall primroses

Like maidens waiting to dance.

They stood in the same shy poses

Last year, as if to entrance

The stately mulleins to waken

From death and lead them around:

And still they will stand untaken,

Till drops their gold to the ground.

Yes, it was here — September

And silence round me yearned.

Again I've come to remember,

Again for musing returned

To the searing fields’ assuaging,

And the falling leaves’ sad balm:

Away from the world's keen waging —

To harvest and hills and calm.