Thomas Hardy — At Day-Close In November

The ten hours' light is abating,       And a late bird wings across, Where the pines, like waltzers waiting,       Give their black heads a toss. Beech leaves, that yellow the noon-time,       Float past like specks in the eye; I set every tree in my June time,       And now they obscure the sky. And the children who ramble through here       Conceive that there never has been A time when no tall trees grew here,       That none will in time be seen.