Page:Poems Rossetti.djvu/112

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84
AUTUMN.
Over the wheat-fields wide,
And anchored lilies ride.
And the pendulum spider
Swings from side to side,

And blue-black beetles transact business,
And gnats fly in a host,
And furry caterpillars hasten
That no time be lost,
And moths grow fat and thrive,
And ladybirds arrive.

Before green apples blush,
Before green nuts embrown,
Why, one day in the country
Is worth a month in town;
Is worth a day and a year
Of the dusty, musty, lag-last fashion
That days drone elsewhere.


AUTUMN.
I DWELL alone—I dwell alone, alone,
Whilst full my river flows down to the sea,
  Gilded with flashing boats
   That bring no friend to me:
Love-songs, gurgling from a hundred throats,
   O love-pangs, let me be.