DROPS PROM FLORA’S CUP. 135 
THE DEAD LEAF. 
MONTGOMERY. 
Were 1 a trembling leaf, 
On yonder stately tree, 
After a season, gay and brief, 
Condemned to fade and flee; 
I should be loth to fall 
Beside the common way, 
Weltering in mire, and spumed by all, 
Till trodden down to clay. 
Nor would I choose to die 
All on a bed of grass; 
Where thousands of my kindred lie 
And idly rot in mass. 
Nor would I like to spread 
My thin and withered face 
In hortus siccus , pale and dead, 
A mummy of my race. 
No! on the wings of air 
Might I be left to fly, 
I know not and I heed not where, 
A waif of earth and sky; 
Or flung upon the stream, 
Curled like a fairy boat, 
As through the changes of a dream, 
To the world’s end to float. 
Who that hath ever been, 
Could bear to be no more ? 
