Lyric Poem · Death & Loss

Autumn: A Dirge

by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Reading room

1The warm sun is failing, the bleak wind is wailing,

2The bare boughs are sighing, the pale flowers are dying,

3And the Year

4On the earth her death-bed, in a shroud of leaves dead,

5Is lying.

6Come, Months, come away,

7From November to May,

8In your saddest array;

9Follow the bier

10Of the dead cold Year,

11And like dim shadows watch by her sepulchre.

12The chill rain is falling, the nipped worm is crawling,

13The rivers are swelling, the thunder is knelling

14For the Year;

15The blithe swallows are flown, and the lizards each gone

16To his dwelling;

17Come, Months, come away;

18Put on white, black, and gray;

19Let your light sisters play —

20Ye, follow the bier

21Of the dead cold Year,

22And make her grave green with tear on tear.

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“Autumn: A Dirge” by Percy Bysshe Shelley — quilloak.com/poems/autumn-a-dirge

Quick facts

Poem: Autumn: A Dirge
Poet: Percy Bysshe Shelley
Length: 22 lines
Form: Lyric Poem
Themes: Death & Loss, Nature, Autumn

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Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.

Shape: 22 lines · 2 stanzas of 11 lines
Refrains: “Come, Months, come away,”“Of the dead cold Year,”“Come, Months, come away;”Repeated lines act as the poem's hinge or drumbeat.

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Author record: Percy Bysshe Shelley1792–1822
Source record: PoetryDBAutumn: A Dirge by percy-bysshe-shelley, PoetryDB transcription
Display decision: Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
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Text fingerprint: SHA-256 389bb0645e183c86…
Editorial handling: Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.

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Lyric Poem Death & Loss Nature Autumn

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