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The poems of John G. C. Brainard

A new and authentic collection, with an original memoir of his life

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THE INDIAN SUMMER.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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THE INDIAN SUMMER.

What is there sadd'ning in the Autumn leaves?
Have they that “green and yellow melancholy”
That the sweet poet spake of?—Had he seen
Our variegated woods, when first the frost
Turns into beauty all October's charms—
When the dread fever quits us—when the storms
Of the wild Equinox, with all its wet,
Has left the land, as the first deluge left it,
With a bright bow of many colors hung
Upon the forest tops—he had not sighed.

138

The moon stays longest for the Hunter now:
The trees cast down their fruitage, and the blithe
And busy squirrel hoards his winter store:
While man enjoys the breeze that sweeps along
The bright blue sky above him, and that bends
Magnificently all the forest's pride,
Or whispers through the evergreens, and asks,
“What is there sadd'ning in the Autumn leaves?”