Autumn Leaves was published in Littell’s Living Age, Volume 149, Issue 1931 in 1881.
An illustration for the story Autumn Leaves by the author Victor Hugo
Kuroda Seiki, Dead Leaves, 1891
Before the songs I joy in singing,
So young, such wafts of perfume bringing,
Endured the brunt the world allows,
Far from the crowd and all its crushing,
Ah! how they bloomed, a garland blushing,
How green and fragrant, on my brows!
Now torn from off the tree that beareth,
Flowers which the blighting northwind teareth,
— Like a dream’s leavings pitiable —
They wander, scattered hither and thither,
In dustiness and mud to wither,
At the winds’ and the waters’ will.
And like dead leaves in autumn showered,
I see them, of their bloom deflowered,
Blown all along the barren lea;
The while a crowd that presses round me,
And treads to earth the wreath that crowned me,
Goes laughing at the naked tree.
