After Autumn Rain

The hillside smokes With trailing mist around the rosy oaks; While sunset builds A gorgeous Asia in the west she gilds. Auroral streaks Sword through the heavens' Himalayan peaks: In which, behold, Burn mines of Indian ruby and of gold. A moment and A shadow stalks between it and the land. A mist, a breath, A premonition, with the face of death, Turning to frost The air it breathes, like some invisible ghost. Then, wild of hair, Demons seem streaming to their fiery lair: A chasm, the same That splits the clouds' face with a leer of flame. The wind comes up And fills the hollow land as wine a cup. Around and round It skips the dead leaves o'er the forest's ground. A myriad fays And imps seem dancing down the withered ways. And far and near It makes of every bush a whisperer; Telling dark tales Of things that happened in the ghostly vales: Of things the fox Barks at and sees among the haunted rocks: At which the owl Hoots, and the wolf-hound cringes with a growl. Now on the road It walks like feet too weary for their load. Shuffling the leaves, With stormy sighs, onward it plods and heaves; Till in the hills Among the red death there itself it kills. And with its death Earth, so its seems, draws in a mighty breath. And, like a clown Who wanders lost upon a haunted down, Turns towards the east, Fearful of coming goblin or of beast, And sees a light, The jack-o'-lantern moon, glow into sight..