Has it a meaning, after all? 
  Or is it one of Nature’s lies,
That net of beauty that she casts
  Over Life’s unsuspecting eyes?

That web of beauty that she weaves
  For one strange purpose of her own,—­
For this the painted butterfly,
  For this the rose—­for this alone!

Strange repetition of the rose,
  And strange reiterated call
Of bird and insect, man and maid,—­
  Is that the meaning of it all?

If it means nothing, after all! 
  And nothing lives, except to die—­
It is enough—­that solemn light
  Behind the barns, and you and I.

TO A ROSE

O rose! forbear to flaunt yourself,
  All bloom and dew—­
I once, sad-hearted as I am,
  Was young as you.

But, one by one, the petals fell
  Earthward to rot;
Only a berry testifies
  A rose forgot.

INVITATION

Unless you come while still the world is green,
  A place of birds and the blue dreaming sea,
In vain has all the singing summer been,
  Unless you come, and share it all with me.

Ah! come, ere August flames its heart away,
  Ere, like a golden widow, autumn goes
Across the woodlands, sad with thoughts of May,
  An aster in her bosom for a rose.

SUMMER GOING

Crickets calling,
Apples falling.

Summer dying,
Life is flying.

So soon over—­
Love and lover.

AUTUMN TREASURE

Who will gather with me the fallen year,
This drift of forgotten forsaken leaves,
Ah! who give ear
To the sigh October heaves
At summer’s passing by! 
Who will come walk with me
On this Persian carpet of purple and gold
The weary autumn weaves,
And be as sad as I? 
Gather the wealth of the fallen rose,
And watch how the memoried south wind blows
Old dreams and old faces upon the air,
And all things fair.

WINTER

Winter, some call thee fair,
Yea! flatter thy cold face
With vain compare
Of all thy glittering ways
And magic snows
With summer and the rose;
Thy phantom flowers
And fretted traceries
Of crystal breath,
Thy frozen and fantastic art of death,
With April as she showers
The violet on the leas,
And bares her bosom
In the blossoming trees,
And dances on her way
To laugh with May—­
Winter that hath no bird
To sing thee, and no bloom
To deck thy brow: 
To me thou art an empty haunted room,
Where once the music
Of the summer stirred,
And all the dancers
Fallen on silence now.

THE MYSTIC FRIENDS