Equinox: A Poem of the Hanover Fall Season

I

Perhaps one should not love a land so much That leaving it a space is very death. Now that the year is turning, and the touch Of autumn tarnishes the earth, and breath Of morning wind and evening wind is cold, Though the blue noon is languid. Now the night Is strewn with cries of birds upon the old Mysterious voyaging to islands bright With endless August. Now the warm stars wane, Arcturus with the sunset soon is gone, Again the frosty Pleiads rise, again Orion hunts along the hills of dawn.

II

September's sun still warms the golden hills, Little there is to hint that summers pass; Only a rare, bright crest of maple spills Its spent leaves silently upon the grass, And orchard trees their burdened branches fling Over the ruinous and rambling walls, Where scampering creatures speed their foraging, Sensing the sharpness as the evening falls. Now day and night are to a balance brought. Slowly the planet's swinging overwhelms All the green magic that the summer wrought— A fire of ivy kindles in the elms.

III

High on the barren ranges has begun The year's destruction, where the loud winds talk Among the huddled rocks on Washington, And lash the low trees crouched on Moosilauke And Lafayette. The valiant summer fails Upon the heights, the yellow birch leaves drift Across the valleys. Soon along the trails Where flowers tossed, the level snow will sift. Already each ravine reverberates With thunderous, dark wind when dusk has died. Over the north horizon something waits, And gathers strength, and will not be denied.

IV

Perhaps one should not love a land so well That leaving it can knot the heartstrings so, Can catch the throat, can cast a shadow spell Over the earth's bright splendor. Yet I know My heart is desert that I shall not see October blowing flame across my world, Flaunting on each hill road her pageantry, Or days of pouring wind when leaves are whirled Away, and the full arch of heaven appears, And dark brooks hold the moon again, and high Over the grey, snow-hungry hills there veers A wedge of geese beneath an iron sky.

V

This failing year I shall not walk beside The cold Connecticut in wind-run dusks, Watching December check its soundless, wide Unrest. Nor shall I hear the wasted husks Of harvest whisper in the drifted field, When fades the day's blue wonder, and the deep Sky burns with stars. For me shall be revealed No clearing peaks, snow bannered; nor the sweep Of arctic lights that up the midnight stream Above a healing wind that halts the stir Of noon-thaw, nor the gold and purple dream Of dusk in Norwich, dawn in Hanover.

VI

The year is turning now, the tides of change Disturb the earth and sky; one hemisphere Lifts from the sunshine. Under in the strange Far lands the spring begins. No peace is here Without me or within. Now comes at length The day to dig my deep roots from the loam Of these spare uplands that have bred my strength, This hill land, this New Hampshire that is home. Red autumn lights her torches. On the shore The troubled birds their blind migrations start. I shall remember, I shall come once more To seek these hills whose winds are at my heart.