When the Woods Turn Brown / Lucy Larcom

When the Woods Turn Brown

How will it be when the roses fade
Out of the garden and out of the glade?
When the fresh pink bloom of the sweet-brier wild,
That leans from the dell like the cheek of a child,
Is changed for dry hips on a thorny bush?
Then scarlet and carmine the groves will flush.

How will it be when the autumn flowers
Wither away from their leafless bowers;
When sun-flower and star-flower and golden-rod
Glimmer no more from the frosted sod;
And hillside nooks are empy and cold?
Then the forest-tops will be gay with gold.

How will is be then the woods turn brown,
Their gold and their crimson all dropped down,
And crumbled to dust? O then, as we lay
Our ear to earth's lips, we shall hear her say,
"In the dark I am seeking new gems for my crown."
We will dream of green leaves when the woods turn brown.

~~
Lucy Larcom (1824-1893)
from Wild Roses of Cape Ann, and other poems, 1881

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Lucy Larcom biography