Autumn

How sad the breath of autumn sighs,
With mourning and decay;
The woods are clothed in varying dyes,
Of funeral array.

Where beauty bloomed of late around,
On mountain top and vale,
Now wither'd foliage strews the ground,
And tells a piteous tale.

And summer birds are on the wing,
Bound for a warmer sky,
They greeted us in early spring--
They bid us now good bye.

So pass away our early years,
Youth sinks into decay,
And age, like autumn soon appears,
And quick we pass away.