{
 "id": "henry-van-dyke-jr/autumn-in-the-garden",
 "title": "Autumn in the Garden",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Henry van Dyke Jr.",
 "poet_slug": "henry-van-dyke-jr",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Poems of Henry Van Dyke",
 "book_slug": "poems",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 71,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1920,
  "venue": "The Poems of Henry Van Dyke (1920)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1920 collected edition. That is the printing this text comes from, not the poem's first appearance: the volume gathers work published from 1897 onward, and which earlier book or magazine printed this poem first has not been established here.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsofhenryvand00vandrich"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/henry-van-dyke-jr_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16229",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16134",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10679",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3525",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9372",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29314",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43094",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsofhenryvand00vandrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/buildersotherpoe00vandrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/toilingoffelixan00vandiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/musicotherpoems0000henr_c7v6",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsnowfirstcol00vanduoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/songsoutofdoors0000vand",
   "https://archive.org/details/thyseaisgreatour00vandiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/chosenpoems0000vand"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 40,
  "n_stanzas": 5,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 55,
  "max_indent": 5
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "When the frosty kiss of Autumn in the dark",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Makes its mark",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "On the flowers, and the misty morning grieves",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Over fallen leaves;",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "Then my olden garden, where the golden soil",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through the toil",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "Of a hundred years is mellow, rich, and deep,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whispers in its sleep.",
    "indent": 5
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "‘Mid the crumpled beds of marigold and phlox,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where the box",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "Borders with its glossy green the ancient walks,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There’s a voice that talks",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the human hopes that bloomed and withered here",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Year by year⁠—",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "And the dreams that brightened all the labouring hours.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fading as the flowers.",
    "indent": 5
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Yet the whispered story does not deepen grief;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But relief",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "For the loneliness of sorrow seems to flow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From the Long-Ago,",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "When I think of other lives that learned, like mine,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To resign,",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "And remember that the sadness of the fall",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Comes alike to all.",
    "indent": 5
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "What regrets, what longings for the lost were theirs I",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And what prayers",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "For the silent strength that nerves us to endure",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Things we cannot cure!",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "Pacing up and down the garden where they paced,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I have traced",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "All their well-worn paths of patience, till I find",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Comfort in my mind.",
    "indent": 5
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Faint and far away their ancient griefs appear:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet how near",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "Is the tender voice, the careworn, kindly face,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the human race!",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "Let us walk together in the garden, dearest heart⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not apart!",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "They who know the sorrows other lives have known",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Never walk alone.",
    "indent": 5
   }
  ]
 ]
}