Sonnet XVI. November

The mellow year is hasting to its close;The little birds have almost sung their last,Their small notes twitter in the dreary blast --That shrill-piped harbinger of early snows:The patient beauty of the scentless rose,Oft with the Morn's hoar chrystal quaintly glass'd,Hangs, a pale mourner for the summer past,And makes a little summer where it grows:In the chill sunbeam of the faint brief dayThe dusky waters shudder as they shine,The russet leaves obstruct the straggling wayOf oozy brooks, which no deep banks define,And the gaunt woods, in ragged, scant array,Wrap their old limbs with sombre ivy twine.