Page:Poems of nature, Thoreau, 1895.djvu/104

80 Small birds, in fleets migrating by,

Now beat across some meadow's bay,

And as they tack and veer on high,

With faint and hurried click beguile the way.

Far in the woods, these golden days,

Some leaf obeys its Maker's call;

And through their hollow aisles it plays

With delicate touch the prelude of the Fall.

Gently withdrawing from its stem,

It lightly lays itself along

Where the same hand hath pillowed them,

Resigned to sleep upon the old year's throng.

The loneliest birch is brown and sere,

The furthest pool is strewn with leaves,