After Autumn Rain

The hillside smokes     With trailing mist around the rosy oaks;     While sunset builds     A gorgeous Asia in the west she gilds.     Auroral streaks     Sword through the heavens' Himalayan peaks:     In which, behold,     Burn mines of Indian ruby and of gold.     A moment and     A shadow stalks between it and the land.     A mist, a breath,     A premonition, with the face of death,     Turning to frost     The air it breathes, like some invisible ghost.     Then, wild of hair,     Demons seem streaming to their fiery lair:     A chasm, the same     That splits the clouds' face with a leer of flame.     The wind comes up     And fills the hollow land as wine a cup.     Around and round     It skips the dead leaves o'er the forest's ground.     A myriad fays     And imps seem dancing down the withered ways.     And far and near     It makes of every bush a whisperer;     Telling dark tales     Of things that happened in the ghostly vales:     Of things the fox     Barks at and sees among the haunted rocks:     At which the owl     Hoots, and the wolf-hound cringes with a growl.     Now on the road     It walks like feet too weary for their load.     Shuffling the leaves,     With stormy sighs, onward it plods and heaves;     Till in the hills     Among the red death there itself it kills.     And with its death     Earth, so its seems, draws in a mighty breath.     And, like a clown     Who wanders lost upon a haunted down,     Turns towards the east,     Fearful of coming goblin or of beast,     And sees a light,     The jack-o'-lantern moon, glow into sight..