The death of Autumn

When reeds are dead and straw to thatch the marshes,

And feathered pampas-grass rides into the wind

Like agèd warriors westward, tragic, thinned

Of half their tribe; an over the flattened rushes,

Stripped of its secret, open, stark and bleak,

Blackens afar the half-forgotten creek, --

Then leans on me the weight of the year, and crushes

My heart. I know that beauty must ail and die,

And will be born again, -- but ah, to see

Beauty stiffened, staring up at the sky!

Oh, Autumn! Autumn! -- What is the Spring to me?