Three poplars paused beside a brook
Before the autumnal mountain,
Then bowed to me, and undertook
The dance of death and shone and shook
Like waters in a fountain.
O, high the happy bosom heaves
When love is in the dancer!
But life falls quiet as the leaves,
And soon the dance of death bereaves
A lover of his answer.
Lightly a girl had danced away
Her breath and all her laughter;
A boy went joining her one day;
And a little fellow, at his play,
Saw them and followed after ...
And now three poplars poised and shook
Like waters in a fountain
And, iridescent, undertook
The dance of death beside a brook
Between me and the mountain.
