Wan sleep the sunken oak-leaves in the lake
While over them the ripples come and go;
Too deep their dream for little waves to break
With busy idleness of to and fro.

Green glanced the hope and garnet glowed the pride,
All ghost and wreckage ere the year is done.
Poor perished leaves! but toward the waterside
There glides a glory from the westering sun.

Strangely these victims of the frost and storm
Beneath that crystal shield their hues reclaim,
Pouring such treasured glories forth as form
A tessellated floor of sudden flame.

How much of loss and ruin went to weave
This flush as transient as a world's desire!
But who would not be shattered to achieve
Such brief, divine apocalypse of fire!