The Fall of the Leaves

Autumn had strewn on field and valeThe dead leaves from the forest reft:Naked the mournful groves were left,And silent was the nightingale.Oppressed with melancholy thoughtAn invalid, in years but young,But by long suffering unstrung,The wood beloved in boyhood sought.Dear wood, he said, adieu! adieu!Like me you mourn your hapless fate;Forlorn and all disconsolate,In yours my own sad doom I view.A messenger of final doomEach leaf in falling seems to say,Soon thou like us shalt pass away.Thy fate like ours is steeped in gloom:Around thee dose the shades of death;Wanner than autumn's wannest leafSoon must thou yield thy latest breath,—No respite hope, however brief.

Yes! I must die! my spring has fledLong ere its time, and winter's frostWithers me with its icy breath,And warns me that all hope is lostLaid low by unrelenting death,Sweet flowers and herbs my corse shall deck,But ah! my sad and frustrate lifeFruitage of deeds must ever lack.Descend, ye leaves ephemeral,And cover me as I am dying,Let not my mother's vision fallWhere breathless, motionless, I'm lying:But if my love comes hither, whenFate can inflict no further sorrow,To weep my hapless lot—oh! thenSome comfort shall my spirit borrow.

No more he said, but thence departed,His wanderings there for ever o'er.When from the tree the last leaf startedDestiny tortured him no more.Beneath an oak his corse was laid;But she whom he had loved so dearlyCame not the silence to invadeWhich reigned about his grave austerely;Save when the shepherd went his roundThe solitude was void of sound.