WHEN I go through the meadows brown,
Where stand the tall weeds, sere and dead,
Think you I find no beauty there,
Since Summer through the fields has fled?
The edges of the frozen stream,
Whose quiet waters late were crossed
By shadows of the bending fern,
Are fair with fringes of the frost.
Wherever cowslips crowded thick,
Or banks of buttercups would be,
A host of airy forms in white,
Like ghosts of flowers returned, I see.
It may be clustered flakes of snow,
Or frozen dew still glistening there,
But still it seems as if there came
A rare, strange odor through the air.