How like a winter

hath my absence been

From thee,

the pleasure

of the fleeting year!

What freezings have I felt,

what dark days seen!

What old December's

bareness everywhere!

And yet this time removed

was summer's time;

The teeming autumn,

big with rich increase,

Bearing the wanton burden

of the prime,

Like widow'd wombs

after their lords' decease:

Yet this abundant issue

seemed to me

But hope of orphans,

and unfathered fruit;

For summer

and his pleasures

wait on thee,

And, thou away,

the very birds are mute:

Or, if they sing,

'tis with so dull a cheer,

That leaves look pale,

dreading the winter's near.