In the wood the dead trees stand,

Dead and living, hand to hand,

Being Winter, who can tell

Which is sick and which is well ?

Standing upright, day by day

Sullenly their hearts decay

Till a wise wind lays them low,

Prostrate, empty, then we know.

So thro' forests of the street,

Men stand dead upon their feet,

Corpses without epitaph;

God withholds his wind of wrath,

So we greet them, and they smile,

Dead and doomed a weary while,

Only sometimes thro' their eyes

We can see the worm that plies.