Now all Nature is alive,
     Bird and beetle, man and mole;
     Bee-like goes the human hive,
     Lark-like sings the soaring soul: 
     Hearty faith and honest cheer
     Welcome in the sweet o’ the year.

     Autumn even-song

     The long cloud edged with streaming grey
     Soars from the West;
     The red leaf mounts with it away,
     Showing the nest
     A blot among the branches bare: 
     There is a cry of outcasts in the air.

     Swift little breezes, darting chill,
     Pant down the lake;
     A crow flies from the yellow hill,
     And in its wake
     A baffled line of labouring rooks: 
     Steel-surfaced to the light the river looks.

     Pale on the panes of the old hall
     Gleams the lone space
     Between the sunset and the squall;
     And on its face
     Mournfully glimmers to the last: 
     Great oaks grow mighty minstrels in the blast.

     Pale the rain-rutted roadways shine
     In the green light
     Behind the cedar and the pine: 
     Come, thundering night! 
     Blacken broad earth with hoards of storm: 
     For me yon valley-cottage beckons warm.

     The song of courtesy

     I

     When Sir Gawain was led to his bridal-bed,
     By Arthur’s knights in scorn God-sped:-
     How think you he felt? 
     O the bride within
     Was yellow and dry as a snake’s old skin;
     Loathly as sin! 
     Scarcely faceable,
     Quite unembraceable;
     With a hog’s bristle on a hag’s chin! —
     Gentle Gawain felt as should we,
     Little of Love’s soft fire knew he: 
     But he was the Knight of Courtesy.

     II

     When that evil lady he lay beside
     Bade him turn to greet his bride,
     What think you he did? 
     O, to spare her pain,
     And let not his loathing her loathliness vain
     Mirror too plain,
     Sadly, sighingly,
     Almost dyingly,
     Turned he and kissed her once and again. 
     Like Sir Gawain, gentles, should we? 
     Silent, all!  But for pattern agree
     There’s none like the Knight of Courtesy.

     III

     Sir Gawain sprang up amid laces and curls: 
     Kisses are not wasted pearls:-
     What clung in his arms? 
     O, a maiden flower,
     Burning with blushes the sweet bride-bower,
     Beauty her dower! 
     Breathing perfumingly;
     Shall I live bloomingly,
     Said she, by day, or the bridal hour? 
     Thereat he clasped her, and whispered he,
     Thine, rare bride, the choice shall be. 
     Said she, Twice blest is Courtesy!

     IV