THE EQUINOX
And I am in despair of Thee and Time.
Weeping the trees, and all the streams grown sullen
Under the lowering skies, and the bitter winds
There is no living thing in the temple of Summer,
And the ashes of Spring lie cold on the hearth of day.
Gray dreams again
I
And all my hope is fled.
Gray dreams, gray dreams, and the day is tired and dead
The bitter aftermath of Summer brings
Time’s memory back to the world: there are no stings,
In the world’s pain, but only bitterness
Of the memory of Time; no sore distress,
Save for the thought of Summer waned and dead,
And faded with the gold skies overhead,
And the young green beneath
; ah
! secret Rose,
Here in the heart of the woods I pluck thee forth,
Fraught with the swell of Summer, crimson—bright
!
And for the world under the stars to—night—
It shall be thine, and thine the star that draws
The world to worship thee : the days are fled
Under the heavens ; there is no more sun,
And no more love; the world is hushed and dead.
Slim—passing dryad through the lonely woods
!
I will follow thee in the paths of dank decay
;
Decadent Autumn, with thy lonely broods
Of active gnomes, and little red-capped Fays,
Feasting in the Summer dead under the trees
Dripping with Autumn rains—ah! take me too,
Me too into the silence of the past,
I 50