Poems (Blake)/An Autumn Thought

by Mary Elizabeth Blake

For works with similar titles, see An Autumn Thought.

AN AUTUMN THOUGHT.

Above the hills the golden leaflets shine,
 And crimson sunset clouds are brightly drifting,
Like gorgeous vailings which a Hand divine
 Between His world and ours is slowly lifting,
   While yellow harvest grain
   Is bright'ning all the plain.

A glory rests upon the silent land,
 More beautiful than summer's fairest blooming,
The wondrous cunning of a Master's hand
 That hides away decay and death and glooming,
   And gives us Autumn's grace
   Ere Winter comes apace.

The tender dawning of the May-time's bloom,
 The fair June days with all their passing sweetness,
Rise up again like shadows from the tomb,
 To find the measure of their full completeness
   Blazoned on vale and height,
   Beneath October's light.

A mystic peace is brooding in the air,
 A subtle charm the quiet valley folding,
And memory walks beside me, everywhere,
 Like some fair Fate my inmost fancies holding,
   To fill with peace divine
   This longing heart of mine.

I sit and muse, not darkly and apart,
 The lesson of its bloom and brightness robbing,
But where each pulse of mother Nature's heart
 Sets all my blood in joyous measure throbbing,
   Amid the ripened sheaves
   And glowing Autumn leaves;

And think that thus in solemn splendor dressed,
 As one by one the ties of earth do sever,
The soul of man should seek its winter rest
 To find, far off, the Spring which blooms forever,
   Where love and hope and truth
   Are bright with heaven's own youth.