The Last of Summer (I)

A beauty on the scene attends
Ere autumn comes and summer ends,
When summer's glory first we see
As stained with its mortality.

Each morn wakes wan, its sunlight wanes
On yellowing leaves and fading plains;
Green fields no more the summer views,
All sickened into ripened hues

Of brown and grey and darksome glooms
That mark the path where autumn comes;
And in each woodland's buried way
The dewdrop lives for half the day.

Dank mists oft creep 'twixt earth and sky,
And dreaming dim the morning's eye,
And dullness wears along the while
As if the sun was loath to smile.

Yet at midday his feebled powers
Will brighten up in sultry hours,
And sweating toil, that often stops
To wipe aside the falling drops.

Pierced with his downward daily ray,
Wishes the lagging hours away.
By swallows we may plain perceive
When summer's on the point to leave.

(to be continued...)