Into the wood the old king went

And greeted an ash and touched an oak.

Out of his sore soul’s discontent

He sighed and spoke:

“Children I had, and they are dead.

A wife I had, and she is lost.

What do you do, good trees,” he said,

“At the hour of frost?”

The oak-trees soughed, the ash-tree sighed,

But never a word they gave that king.

The crow in the ash-tree cawed and cried,

But did not sing.

The old king shut his two eyes fast,

And leant his forehead against the tree,

And thought of all the dead leaves past—

A marvellous company.

They came, they came, like waves of the sea,

These ghosts of leaves came round that king.

They hushed, they whispered, ceaselessly;

And he heard them sing: