September - An 1865 Ohio Poem

Sweet is the voice that calls

From babbling waterfalls,

In meadows where the downy seeds are flying;

And soft the blooms blow,

And eddying come and go,

In faded gardens where the rose is dying.

 

Among the stubbed core

The blithe quail pipes at morn,

The merry partridge dreams in hidden places,

And glittering insects gleam

Above the ruddy stream

Where busy spiders spin their filmy lassoes.

 

At eve, cool shadows fall

Across the garden wall,

And on the clustered grapes to purple turning,

And pearly vapors lie

Along the eastern sky,

Where the broad harvest moon is redly burning.

 

Ah, soon on field and hill

The winds shall whistle chill,

And patriarch swallows call their flocks together,

To fly from frost or snow,

And seek for lands where blow

The fairer blossoms of a balmier weather.

 

The pollen-dusted bees

Search for the honey lees

That linger in the last flower of September,

While plaintive mourning doves

Coo sadly to their loves

Of the dead summer they so well remember.

 

The cricket chirps all day.

"Oh, fairest summer, stay!"

The squirrel eyes askance the chestnuts browning;

The wild fowl fly afar

Above the foamy bar,

And hasten southward ere the skies are frowning.

 

Now cometh a fragrant breeze

Through the dark cedar trees

And round my temple fondly lingers,

In gentle playfulness,

Like to the soft caress

Believed in happier days by loving fingers.

 

Yet, through a sense of grief.

Comes with a falling leaf,

And memory makes the summer doubly pleasant,

In all my autumn dreams

A future summer gleams,

Passing the fairest glories of the present.

September 22, 1865. Chardon Jeffersonian Democrat 17(39): 1.