Thoreau’s Autumnal Sun

“I am the autumnal sun,
With autumn gales my race is run;
When will the hazel put forth its flowers,
Or the grape ripen under my bowers?

When will the harvest or the hunter’s moon
Turn my midnight into mid-noon?
I am all sere and yellow,
And to my core mellow.

 The mast is dropping within my woods,
The winter is lurking within my moods,

And the rustling of the withered leaf
Is the constant music of my grief…”

~Henry David Thoreau 

Here is a fantastic article by Robert Richardson from the Huffington Post a couple of years back on why Thoreau is our finest writer on Autumn. “Thoreau doesn’t just give you one autumn, he gives you the way to see every autumn.”  Read on:

Fall Poetry: Why Thoreau Adored Autumn