The House at the Cascades

All changed now through neglect. The steps dismantled 
By infantries of ants, by roots and storms,
The pillars tugged by vines, the porte-cochère 
A passageway for winds, the solemn porches 
Warped into caricatures.
                           We came at evening
After the rain, when every drunken leaf 
Was straining, swelling in a riot of green. 
Only the house was dying in all that life, 
As if a triumph of emerald energy
Had fixed its mouth upon the walls and stones. 
The tamest shrub remembered anarchy
And joined in appetite with the demagogue weed 
That springs where order falls; together there 
They stormed the defenseless handiwork of man 
Whose empire wars against him when he turns 
A moment from the yoke. So, turning back, 
He sees his rooftree fall to furious green, 
His yard despoiled, and out of innocent noon 
The insect-cloud like thunder on the land.