Autumn: A Dirge

Percy Bysshe Shelley 1792 (Horsham) – 1822 (Lerici)




The warm sun is falling, the bleak wind is wailing,
The bare boughs are sighing, the pale flowers are dying,
                         And the Year
On the earth is her death-bed, in a shroud of leaves dead,
                         Is lying.
               Come, Months, come away,
               From November to May,
               In your saddest array;
               Follow the bier
               Of the dead cold Year,
And like dim shadows watch by her sepulchre.

The chill rain is falling, the nipped worm is crawling,
The rivers are swelling, the thunder is knelling
                         For the Year;
The blithe swallows are flown, and the lizards each gone
                         To his dwelling.
               Come, Months, come away;
               Put on white, black and gray;
               Let your light sisters play--
               Ye, follow the bier
               Of the dead cold Year,
And make her grave green with tear on tear.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 31, 2023

40 sec read
155

Quick analysis:

Scheme aabxaCccdBb aabxaCccdBx
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 946
Words 134
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 11, 11

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is regarded by critics as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. more…

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