Page:Poems Eckley.djvu/32

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THE DEATH OF SUMMER.
 
"We all do fade as a leaf."
GO—Leave the bier in the forest,
Wrapped in the shrivelled leaves,
Go, leave the north-wind untying
The withes of the golden sheaves.
For the day of vintage is over,
The wine from the grape is born,
From the sheaf is trodden the grain,
From the hedge the rose is torn.

Hark! to the funeral voices
That whisper from leaf and rill,
While the chestnuts weave their leaf-shrouds,
And shadows fall from the hill.
But what have the leaves to tell me,
As they whisper through the boughs,
And cover the bier of summer,
Ere the cruel frost-wind blows?