The Old Byway

Madison Julius Cawein 1865 ( Louisville, Kentucky) – 1914 ( Cave Hill Cemetery, Louisville, Kentucky)



Its rotting fence one scarcely sees
Through sumac and wild blackberries,
Thick elder and the bramble-rose,
Big ox-eyed daisies where the bees
Hang droning in repose.

The little lizards lie all day
Gray on its rocks of lichen-gray;
And, insect-Ariels of the sun,
The butterflies make bright its way,
Its path where chipmunks run.

A lyric there the redbird lifts,
While, twittering, the swallow drifts
'Neath wandering clouds of sleepy cream,-
In which the wind makes azure rifts,-
O'er dells where wood-doves dream.

The brown grasshoppers rasp and bound
Mid weeds and briers that hedge it round;
And in its grass-grown ruts,-where stirs
The harmless snake,-mole-crickets sound
Their faery dulcimers.

At evening, when the sad west turns
To lonely night a cheek that burns,
The tree-toads in the wild-plum sing;
And ghosts of long-dead flowers and ferns
The winds wake, whispering.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

44 sec read
54

Quick analysis:

Scheme AABAB CCDCD EEFEF GGXGA HHIHI
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 862
Words 147
Stanzas 5
Stanza Lengths 5, 5, 5, 5, 5

Madison Julius Cawein

Madison Julius Cawein (March 23, 1865 – December 8, 1914) was a poet from Louisville, Kentucky. more…

All Madison Julius Cawein poems | Madison Julius Cawein Books

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    "The Old Byway" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 19 Mar. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/43264/the-old-byway>.

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