The overture
October's orchestra plays softly on
The northern forest with its thousand strings,
And Autumn, the conductor wields anon
The Golden-rod-- The baton that he swings.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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Aspens
A sweet high treble threads its silvery song,
Voice of the restless aspen, fine and thin
It trills its pure soprano, light and long-
Like the vibretto of a mandolin.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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The maple
I
It is the blood-hued maple straight and strong,
Voicing abroad its patriotic song.
II
Its daring colours bravely flinging forth
The ensign of the Nation of the North.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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The vine
The wild grape mantling the trail and tree,
Festoons in graceful veils its drapery,
Its tendrils cling, as clings the memory stirred
By some evasive haunting tune, twice heard.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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Autumn's orchestra
(INSCRIBED TO ONE BEYOND SEAS)
Know by the thread of music woven through
This fragile web of cadences I spin,
That I have only caught these songs since you
Voiced them upon your haunting violin.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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Hare-bell
Elfin bell in azure dress,
Chiming all day long,
Ringing through the wilderness
Dulcet notes of song.
Daintiest of forest flowers
Weaving like a spell--
Music through the Autumn hours,
Little Elfin bell.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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Mosses
The lost wind wandering, forever grieves
Low overhead,
Above grey mosses whispering of leaves
Fallen and dead.
And through the lonely night sweeps their refrain
Like Chopin's prelude, sobbing 'neath the rain.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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The firs
There is a lonely minor chord that sings
Faintly and far along the forest ways,
When the firs finger faintly on the strings
Of that rare violin the night wind plays,
Just as it whispered once to you and me
Beneath the English pines beyond the sea.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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Good-bye
Sounds of the seas grow fainter,
Sounds of the sands have sped;
The sweep of gales,
The far white sails,
Are silent, spent and dead.
Sounds of the days of summer
Murmur and die away,
And distance hides
The long, low tides,
As night shuts out the day.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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The Giant Oak
And then the sound of marching armies 'woke
Amid the branches of the soldier oak,
And tempests ceased their warring cry, and dumb
The lashing storms that muttered, overcome,
Choked by the heralding of battle smoke,
When these gnarled branches beat their martial drum.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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