It 's autumn in the country I remember. <br /> <br />How warm a wind blew here about the ways! <br />And shadows on the hillside lay to slumber <br />During the long sun-sweetened summer-days. <br /> <br />It's cold abroad the country I remember. <br /> <br />The swallows veering skimmed the golden grain <br />At midday with a wing aslant and limber; <br />And yellow cattle browsed upon the plain. <br /> <br />It 's empty down the country I remember. <br /> <br />I had a sister lovely in my sight: <br />Her hair was dark, her eyes were very sombre; <br />We sang together in the woods at night. <br /> <br />It 's lonely in the country I remember. <br /> <br />The babble of our children fills my ears, <br />And on our hearth I stare the perished ember <br />To flames that show all starry thro' my tears. <br /> <br />It 's dark about the country I remember. <br /> <br />There are the mountains where I lived. The path <br />Is slushed with cattle-tracks and fallen timber, <br />The stumps are twisted by the tempests' wrath. <br /> <br />But that I knew these places are my own, <br />I 'd ask how came such wretchedness to cumber <br />The earth, and I to people it alone. <br /> <br />It rains across the country I remember.<br /><br />Trumbull Stickney<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/mnemosyne/
