| HOW memory cuts away the years, | |
| And how clean the picture comes | |
| Of autumn days, brisk and busy; | |
| Charged with keen sunshine. | |
| And you, stirred with activity, | 5 |
| The spirit of those energetic days. | |
| |
| There was our back-yard, | |
| So plain and stripped of green, | |
| With even the weeds carefully pulled away | |
| From the crooked red bricks that made the walk, | 10 |
| And the earth on either side so black. | |
| |
| Autumn and dead leaves burning in the sharp air. | |
| And winter comforts coming in like a pageant. | |
| I shall not forget them:— | |
| Great jars laden with the raw green of pickles, | 15 |
| Standing in a solemn row across the back of the porch, | |
| Exhaling the pungent dill; | |
| And in the very centre of the yard, | |
| You, tending the great catsup kettle of gleaming copper, | |
| Where fat, red tomatoes bobbed up and down | 20 |
| Like jolly monks in a drunken dance. | |
| And there were bland banks of cabbages that came by the wagon-load, | |
| Soon to be cut into delicate ribbons | |
| Only to be crushed by the heavy, wooden stompers. | |
| Such feathery whiteness—to come to kraut! | 25 |
| And after, there were grapes that hid their brightness under a grey dust, | |
| Then gushed thrilling, purple blood over the fire; | |
| And enamelled crab-apples that tricked with their fragrance | |
| But were bitter to taste. | |
| And there were spicy plums and ill-shaped quinces, | 30 |
| And long string beans floating in pans of clear water | |
| Like slim, green fishes. | |
| And there was fish itself, | |
| Salted, silver herring from the city.... | |
| |
| And you moved among these mysteries, | 35 |
| Absorbed and smiling and sure; | |
| Stirring, tasting, measuring, | |
| With the precision of a ritual. | |
| I like to think of you in your years of power— | |
| You, now so shaken and so powerless— | 40 |
| High priestess of your home. | |
