Jessie B. Rittenhouse, ed. (1869–1948). The Second Book of Modern Verse. 1922.

Smith, of the Third Oregon, dies

AUTUMN in Oregon is wet as Spring,

And green, with little singings in the grass,

And pheasants flying,

Gold, green and red,

Great, narrow, lovely things,

As if an orchid had snatched wings.

There are strange birds like blots against a sky

Where a sun is dying.

Beyond the river where the hills are blurred

A cloud, like the one word

Of the too-silent sky, stirs, and there stand

Black trees on either hand.

Autumn in Oregon is wet and new

As Spring,

And puts a fever like Spring’s in the cheek

That once has touched her dew—

And it puts longing too

In eyes that once have seen

Her season-flouting green,

And ears that listened to her strange birds speak.

Autumn in Oregon—I’ll never see

Those hills again, a blur of blue and rain

Across the old Willamette. I’ll not stir

A pheasant as I walk, and hear it whirr

Above my head, an indolent, trusting thing.

When all this silly dream is finished here,

The fellows will go home to where there fall

Rose-petals over every street, and all

The year is like a friendly festival.

But I shall never watch those hedges drip

Color, not see the tall spar of a ship

In our old harbor.—They say that I am dying,

Perhaps that’s why it all comes back again:

Autumn in Oregon and pheasants flying—