V

Oh, joy, to walk the way that goes Through woods of sweet-gum and of beech! Where, like a ruby left in reach, The berry of the dogwood glows: Or where the bristling hillsides mass, 'Twixt belts of tawny sassafras, Brown shocks of corn in wigwam rows!

Where, in the hazy morning, runs The stony branch that pools and drips, The red-haws and the wild-rose hips Are strewn like pebbles; and the sun's Own gold seems captured by the weeds; To see, through scintillating seeds, The hunters steal with glimmering guns!

Oh, joy, to go the path which lies Through woodlands where the trees are tall! Beneath the misty moon of fall, Whose ghostly girdle prophesies A morn wind-swept and gray with rain; When, o'er the lonely, leaf-blown lane, The night-hawk like a dead leaf flies!

To stand within the dewy ring Where pale death smites the boneset blooms, And everlasting's flowers, and plumes Of mint, with aromatic wing! And hear the creek,--whose sobbing seems A wild-man murmuring in his dreams,-- And insect violins that sing.

Or where the dim persimmon tree Rains on the path its frosty fruit, And in the oak the owl doth hoot, Beneath the moon and mist, to see The outcast Year go,--Hagar-wise,-- With far-off, melancholy eyes, And lips that sigh for sympathy.