giver came to crave
A shelter from the burning heat the while,
Beneath the bending vines the welcome fled,
And yellow harvest seldom crowned his head.

They knew not, as he pressed the table seat,
That he alone had spread the groaning board,
They cared not that the master came to eat
Where one small blessing glittered from his hoard;
They knew not, cared not, how the angel's feet
Have trodden in the steps of good restored--
The furrows deepened on the old man's brow,
And sadly humankind had sped the plough.

Autumn grew brown upon the teeming zone,
Lo! here at last he should forget his pain
Amid the mellow fruits around them thrown,
With garners brimful of the golden grain,
Men should look smiling to the giver's throne,
And gentle peace sit on the loaded wain--
There was a discord when the year began,
That jarred the wider as the circle ran.

The wheat-sheaf grew into the curse of life,
And from the stalk the burning pain distilled--
The orchard mast with the dark bane was rife,
Pouring out poison as the master willed.
The purple wine-grape reddened into strife,
And in its shadow man by man was killed--
Poison, dark poison, rankled in the cup,
Pressed to his lips foredoomed to drink it up.

So should the blessing of the fields and woods
Be moulded into curses? think it not!
Cold and unfeeling man's ingratitude,
Who to the season gave back such a lot,
To drink the cup gemmed with a poison flood,
And bitter with the felon's loathsome blot;
Oh deeply on our bosoms rests the stain
That never years shall wash away again.

The wail of autumn winds was on the air,
That played with forest trunks as little things;
The demons of the storm, each from his lair,
Shot forth and hissed upon the tempest wings;
Rent from the old man's head the scanty hair,
Sung on the north wind as the cordage sings:
Little they spared him in their giant course,
The whirling winds that owed him all their force.

Again 't is winter, to the sons of men
Come forth the snow and wind and driving sleet--
Again the storm-cloud lowers o'er the glen.
Again the branches shiver at our feet.
Faint and uncovered, over moor and fen,
The weary man has come his doom to meet,
The storms of winter beat upon his head,