Lxvi

What alchemy does Earth conceal Desired by the desperate days? With feet of fog and hands of haze They search the crumbling woods and steal With mutterings,--gaunt as hags who deal In witchcraft,--where each dark tree sways, And, venerable, with staff aslant, Death sits like some old mendicant.

Around me all’s despondency, And grief that holds the unwilling world: The last gold leaf is wildly hurled Through sobbing silence over me: The brook has hushed its wildwood glee, Sick of itself; and far unfurled, And melancholy as my soul, The struggling lights of sunset roll.