| Jessie B. Rittenhouse, ed. (1869–1948). The Second Book of Modern Verse. 1922. |
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| Smith, of the Third Oregon, dies |
| | | Mary Carolyn Davies |
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| AUTUMN 1 in Oregon is wet as Spring, | |
| And green, with little singings in the grass, | |
| And pheasants flying, | |
| Gold, green and red, | |
| Great, narrow, lovely things, | 5 |
| As if an orchid had snatched wings. | |
| There are strange birds like blots against a sky | |
| Where a sun is dying. | |
| Beyond the river where the hills are blurred | |
| A cloud, like the one word | 10 |
| Of the too-silent sky, stirs, and there stand | |
| Black trees on either hand. | |
| Autumn in Oregon is wet and new | |
| As Spring, | |
| And puts a fever like Spring’s in the cheek | 15 |
| That once has touched her dew— | |
| And it puts longing too | |
| In eyes that once have seen | |
| Her season-flouting green, | |
| And ears that listened to her strange birds speak. | 20 |
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| Autumn in Oregon—I’ll never see | |
| Those hills again, a blur of blue and rain | |
| Across the old Willamette. I’ll not stir | |
| A pheasant as I walk, and hear it whirr | |
| Above my head, an indolent, trusting thing. | 25 |
| When all this silly dream is finished here, | |
| The fellows will go home to where there fall | |
| Rose-petals over every street, and all | |
| The year is like a friendly festival. | |
| But I shall never watch those hedges drip | 30 |
| Color, not see the tall spar of a ship | |
| In our old harbor.—They say that I am dying, | |
| Perhaps that’s why it all comes back again: | |
| Autumn in Oregon and pheasants flying— | |
| | | Note 1. Reprinted by permission of the publishers, from Drums in Our Street, by Mary Carolyn Davies. Copyright, 1918, by The Macmillan Company. [back] |
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