V

The climbing-cricket in the dusk Moves wings of moony gossamer; Its vague, vibrating note I hear Among the boughs of dew and musk, Whence, rustling with a mellow thud, The ripe quince falls. Low, deep and clear, The west is bound with burning blood.

The slanting bats beneath the moon,-- A dark disk edge with glittering white,-- Spin loops of intertangled night: An owl wakes, hooting over soon, Within the forest far away: And now the heav’n fills, light by light, And all the blood-red west grows gray.

I hear no sound of wind or wave; No sob or song, except the slow Leaf-cricket’s flute-soft tremolo, Among wet walks grown gray and grave.-- In raiment mists of silver sear, With strange, pale eyes thou comest, O Thou Spirit of the Waning-Year!