Anna Seward

While summer roses all their glory yield To crown the votary of love and joy, Misfortune’s victim hails, with many a sigh, Thee, scarlet Poppy of the pathless field, Gaudy, yet wild and lone; no leaf to shield Thy flaccid vest that, as the gale blows high, Flaps, and alternate folds around thy head. So stands in the long grass a love-crazed maid, Smiling aghast; while stream to every wind Her garish ribbons, smeared with dust and rain; But brain-sick visions cheat her totured mind, And bring false peace. Thus, lulling grief and pain, Kind dreams oblivious from thy juice proceed, Thou flimsy, showy, melancholy weed.

Behold that tree, in Autumn’s dim decay, Stripped by the frequent, chill, and eddying wind; Where yet some yellow, lonely leaves we find Lingering and trembling on the naked spray, Twenty, perchance, for millions whirled away! Emblem, also! too just, of humankind! Vain man expects longevity, designed For few indeed; and their protracted day What is it worth that Wisdom does not scorn? The blasts of sickness, care, and grief appal, That laid the friends in dust, whose natal morn Rose near their own; and solemn is the call; Yet, like those weak deserted leaves forlorn, Shivering they cling to life, and fear to fall!

On the fleet streams, the Sun, that late arose, In amber radiance plays; the tall young grass No foot hath bruised; clear morning, as I pass, Breathes the pure gale, that on the blossom blows; And, as with gold yon green hill’s summit glows, The lake inlays the vale with molten glass: Now is the year’s soft youth, yet one, alas! Cheers not as it was wont; impending woes Weigh on my heart; the joys, that once were mine, Spring leads not back; and those that yet remain Fade while she blooms. Each hour more lovely shine Her crystal beams, and feed her floral train, But oh with pale, and warring fires, decline Those eyes, whose light my filial hopes sustain.

While one sere leaf, that parting Autumn yields, Trembles upon the thin, and naked spray, November, dragging on this sunless day, Lours, cold and sullen, on the watery fields; And Nature to the waste dominion yields, Stripped her last robes, with gold and purple gay — So droops my life, of your soft beams despoiled, Youth, Health, and Hope, that long exulting smiled; And the wild carols, and the bloomy hues Of merry Spring-time, spruce on every plain Her half-blown bushes, moist with sunny rain, More pensive thoughts in my sunk heart infuse Than Winter’s grey, and desolate domain Faded like my lost Youth, that no bright Spring renews.