Poem: Autumn

AUTUMN

 I love to see, when leaves depart,                                                                                    1

The clear anatomy arrive,

Winter, the paragon of art,

That kills all forms of life and feeling

Save what is pure and will survive.                                                                                  5

Already now the clanging chains

Of geese are harnessed to the moon:

Stripped are the great sun-clouding planes:

And the dark pines, their own revealing,

Let in the needles of the noon.                                                                                      10

Strained by the gale and the olives whiten

Like hoary wrestlers bent with toil

And, with the vines, their branches lighten

To brim our vats where summer lingers

In the red froth and sun-gold oil.                                                                                     15         

Soon on our hearth’s reviving pyre

Their rotted stems will crumble up:

And like a ruby, panting fire,

The grape will redden on your fingers

Through the lit crystal of the cup.                                                                                   20