Poetry Sunday: Merry Autumn by Paul Laurence Dunbar

When I go looking for a poem to feature here in my Sunday post, I find that I very often turn to Paul Dunbar. This African-American poet of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries often speaks the sentiments that I am feeling. I find that is especially true of this poem. I've never thought of autumn as a solemn or dreary season. In fact it is just about my favorite time of year, the "highest time of living" in the poet's words.

And what about you? Do you find autumn merry?

Merry Autumn

by Paul Laurence Dunbar 

It’s all a farce,—these tales they tell
About the breezes sighing,

And moans astir o’er field and dell,

     Because the year is dying.

 

Such principles are most absurd,—

     I care not who first taught ’em;

There’s nothing known to beast or bird

     To make a solemn autumn.

 

In solemn times, when grief holds sway

     With countenance distressing,

You’ll note the more of black and gray

     Will then be used in dressing.

 

Now purple tints are all around;

     The sky is blue and mellow;

And e’en the grasses turn the ground

     From modest green to yellow.

 

The seed burrs all with laughter crack

     On featherweed and jimson;

And leaves that should be dressed in black

     Are all decked out in crimson.

 

A butterfly goes winging by;

     A singing bird comes after;

And Nature, all from earth to sky,

     Is bubbling o’er with laughter.

 

The ripples wimple on the rills,

     Like sparkling little lasses;

The sunlight runs along the hills,

     And laughs among the grasses.

 

The earth is just so full of fun

     It really can’t contain it;

And streams of mirth so freely run

     The heavens seem to rain it.

 

Don’t talk to me of solemn days

     In autumn’s time of splendor,

Because the sun shows fewer rays,

     And these grow slant and slender.

 

Why, it’s the climax of the year,—

     The highest time of living!—

Till naturally its bursting cheer

     Just melts into thanksgiving.