Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. V. Browning to Rupert Brooke
Richard Watson Dixon (18331900)The Fall of the Leaf
R
Like earth to earth, their children: now they stand
Above the graves where lie their very last:
Each pointing with her empty hand
And mourning o’er the russet floor,
Naked and dispossessed;
The queenly sycamore,
The linden, and the aspen, and the rest.
Who timorously dost keep
From the sad fallen ring thy face away;
Wouldst thou look to the heavens which wander grey,
The unstilled clouds, slow mounting on their way?
They not regard thee, neither do they send
One breath to wake thy sighs, nor gently tend
Thy sorrow or thy smile to passion’s end.
A cloud among the clouds: she giveth pledge,
Which none from hope debars,
Of hours that shall the naked boughs re-fledge
In seasons high: her drifted train among
Musing she leads the silent song,
Grave mistress of white clouds, as lucid queen of stars.