John G. C. Brainard (1796-1828). The Indian Summer. Samuel Kettell, ed. 1829. Specimens of American Poetry

Samuel Kettell, ed. Specimens of American Poetry. 1829.

The Indian Summer

By John G. C. Brainard (1796–1828)


WHAT is there saddening 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—	5
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 sigh’d.	10
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	15
Magnificently all the forest’s pride,
Or whispers through the evergreens, and asks,
“What is there saddening in the Autumn leaves?”