Autumn Days
Yellow, mellow, ripened days,Sheltered in a golden coating;O'er the dreamy, listless haze,White and dainty cloudlets floating;Winking at the blushing trees,And the sombre, furrowed fallow;Smiling at the airy easeOf the southward-flying swallow.Sweet and smiling are thy ways,Beauteous, golden, Autumn days!
Shivering, quivering, tearful days,Fretfully and sadly weeping;Dreading still, with anxious gaze,Icy fetters round thee creeping;O'er the cheerless, withered plain,Woefully and hoarsely calling;Pelting hail and drenching rainOn thy scanty vestments falling.Sad and mournful are thy ways,Grieving, wailing, Autumn days!
Words in this poem
- dreamy a.
- Abounding in dreams or given to dreaming; appropriate to, or like, dreams; visionary.
- listless a.
- Having no desire or inclination; indifferent; heedless; spiritless. [OE. listles, lustles. See Lust.]
- dainty n.
- Value; estimation; the gratification or pleasure taken in anything. [OE. deinie, dainte, deintie, deyntee, OF. deintié delicacy, orig., dignity, honor, fr. L. dignitas, fr. dignus worthy. See Deign, and cf. Dignity.]
- sombre n.
- Gloom; obscurity; duskiness; somberness.
- beauteous a.
- Full of beauty; beautiful; very handsome. [Mostly poetic] -- Beau"te*ous*ly, adv. --
- tearful a.
- Abounding with tears; weeping; shedding tears; as, tearful eyes.
- sadly adv.
- Wearily; heavily; firmly.
- woefully adv.
- In a woeful manner; sorrowfully; mournfully; miserably; dolefully.
- hoarsely adv.
- With a harsh, grating sound or voice.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Autumn Days is in the public domain. This text is taken from Farm Ballads, Project Gutenberg ebook #9500; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Will Carleton, Autumn Days, in Farm Ballads (1873), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #9500, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/carleton-farm-ballads/autumn-days.html, id L23287.
Form and metre
Autumn Days is 20 lines in 2 stanzas of 10 lines each. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 94%).
See other poems in trochaic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABABC-C-AA daysA · coatingB · hazeA · floatingB · treesC · fallow · easeC · swallow · waysA · daysA
- 2 ABABC-C-AA daysA · weepingB · gazeA · creepingB · plainC · calling · rainC · falling · waysA · daysA
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Yellow, mellow, ripened days, | 7 | /˘/˘/˘· |
| Sheltered in a golden coating; | 8 | /˘··/˘/˘ |
| O'er the dreamy, listless haze, | 7 | ··/˘/˘· |
| White and dainty cloudlets floating; | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Winking at the blushing trees, | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| And the sombre, furrowed fallow; | 8 | ··/˘/˘/· |
| Smiling at the airy ease | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| Of the southward-flying swallow. | 8 | ··/˘/˘/˘ |
| Sweet and smiling are thy ways, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Beauteous, golden, Autumn days! | 8 | /˘˘/˘/˘· |
| Shivering, quivering, tearful days, | 7 | /˘/˘/˘· |
| Fretfully and sadly weeping; | 8 | ····/˘/˘ |
| Dreading still, with anxious gaze, | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| Icy fetters round thee creeping; | 8 | /˘/˘··/˘ |
| O'er the cheerless, withered plain, | 7 | ··/˘/˘· |
| Woefully and hoarsely calling; | 8 | /˘˘·/˘/˘ |
| Pelting hail and drenching rain | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| On thy scanty vestments falling. | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Sad and mournful are thy ways, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Grieving, wailing, Autumn days! | 7 | /˘/˘/˘· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.