Charles Bertram Johnson, "Herbstgefuhl" (1905)
The silence of night is abroad and far,
The Earth, empty of summer's song-filled hours,
Is quiet grown, tho' in her desert bowers,
Now deeply still, the querulous crickets mar
The silvery stilliness of moon and star;
Anear me, grieve the fading form of flowers,
The leafless trees despoiled of summer's dowers,
And black the fields with winter's blighting scar
The world seems dead as unfulfilled desires;
No touch is felt of that warm Spirit Birth,
Which from the seed awaking reaspires,
And makes Life victor in the realms of Death;
But still I know beneath the death-won blade
Spring's eviternal hopes are deeply laid.
Published in Colored American Magazine, March 1905