WHEN AUTUMN FADES 



When autumn fades, and from the windy hill 

 And forest glades beside the quiet rill 

 The splendors waste,- and all the happy trees 

 Are quite defaced of beauty, and the breeze 



Makes deep lament with laughter quite forgot, 

 As it were meant for threnody and not 

 For merry mood: and when the blackbirds fling 

 Their dusky brood across the sky on wing 



Toward fields remote, and wild ducks flying high 

 With muffled note make speed across the sky, 

 And redbirds blaze through naked loneliness 

 Of woodland ways : and full of deep distress 



The moaning trees where beat tumultuous tides 

 Of angry seas whose stormy music chides: 

 And all the ways are sown with withered leaves 

 And all the days are dim with haze, and grieves 

 The wintry wind, and the year's evening shades 

 Grow dusk, and blind the storms.; when autumn fades. 



121 



