By Grace Aguilar.
Autumn leaves! How beautiful
Your fading glories are;
O’re hill and dell, o’er wood and fell
Ye shed rich light afar.
Of ev’ry gorgeous hue and shade,
Brown, ruddy, green, and gold;
Each ghance more brilliantly array’d,
New glowing rays unfold.
With smiles of trusting love, ye gild
The pathway to the tomb,
Till Nature, e’en in death, seems fill’d
With loveliness and bloom.
Ye deck with beauty, e’en decay,
And meet with chasten’d mirth
The winds that bear ye far away
To moulder on the earth.
Oh beautiful! Most beautiful,
The lesson that ye speak;
So richly clad, in beauty glad,
To whisper to the meek—
“Fear not! The Hand which robes the tree
In glory e’er it fade,
Hath dearer mercy, man, for thee,
E’en in death’s gloomy shade.
“His love will bless for thee with light
The valley of decay,
And fill thy soul with thoughts as bright
As Autumn’s glorious ray.
“’Tis beauty, all around, above,
To shout, with thrilling voice,
’God loveth all, with such dear love,
He bids e’en death rejoice.’”
