Nothing is new, I have seen the spring too often; There have been other plum-trees white as this one Like a silvery cloud tethered beside the road, I have been waked from sleep too many times By birds at dawn boasting their love is beautiful. The grass-blades gleam in the wind, nothing is changed. Nothing is lost, it is all as it used to be, Unopened lilacs are still as deep a purple, The boughs of the elm are dancing still in a veil of tiny leaves, Nothing is lost but a few years from my life. _Wind Elegy_ (W. E. W.) Only the wind knows he is gone, Only the wind grieves, The sun shines, the fields are sown, Sparrows mate in the eaves; But I heard the wind in the pines he planted And the hemlocks overhead, “His acres wake, for the year turns, But he is asleep,” it said. _In the Wood_ I heard the water-fall rejoice Singing like a choir, I saw the sun flash out of it Azure and amber fire. The earth was like an open flower Enamelled and arrayed, The path I took to find its heart Fluttered with sun and shade. And while earth lured me, gently, gently, Happy and all alone, Suddenly a heavy snake Reared black upon a stone. _Autumn Dusk_ I saw above a sea of hills A solitary planet shine, And there was no one near or far To keep the world from being mine. VIII ARCTURUS IN AUTUMN _Arcturus in Autumn_ When, in the gold October dusk, I saw you near to setting, Arcturus, bringer of spring, Lord of the summer nights, leaving us now in autumn, Having no pity on our withering; Oh then I knew at last that my own autumn was upon me, I felt it in my blood, Restless as dwindling streams that still remember The music of their flood. There in the thickening dark a wind-bent tree above me Loosed its last leaves in flight-- I saw you sink and vanish, pitiless Arcturus, You will not stay to share our lengthening night. “_I Could Snatch a Day_” I could snatch a day out of the late autumn And set it trembling like forgotten springs, There would be sharp blue skies with new leaves shining And flying shadows cast by flying wings. I could take the heavy wheel of the world and break it, But we sit brooding while the ashes fall, Cowering over an old fire that dwindles, Waiting for nothing at all. _An End_ I have no heart for any other joy, The drenched September day turns to depart, And I have said good-bye to what I love; With my own will I vanquished my own heart.