Donald Jeffrey Hayes was one of the quieter voices of the Harlem Renaissance, a period in the early twentieth century when African American writers, artists, and musicians were redefining Black identity in American culture. Hayes published lyrical poems in journals such as Opportunity and The Crisis, but he often turned inward to matters of the heart rather than outward to social protest. His poem “Auf Wiedersehen” takes its title from the German phrase meaning “until we meet again,” and that farewell sets the tone: this is not an ending but a postponed reunion.
The speaker repeats a single vow in each quatrain: “I shall come this way again.” But the timing of that return keeps shifting. First it will happen “on some distant morrow,” after autumn has covered grief with “red and golden leaves.” Then the speaker promises to return when the present day is “rotten / In the grave of yesterdays” and the hour itself is forgotten. Finally, the return will occur “before the lamp light dies,” and its purpose will be gentler than revenge. The speaker will “comfort you and dry the tear / Of penance from your eyes.” The central idea is not simply that absence will end, but that time must first do its work of decay and burial. Only after hurt has faded and guilt has surfaced can the two meet again.
The poem’s construction gives that promise a ritual force. Each stanza is a quatrain with a simple ABCB rhyme scheme, pairing “morrow” with “sorrow,” “rotten” with “forgotten,” and “dies” with “eyes.” The repeated opening line acts almost like a refrain, turning personal intention into something inevitable. The meter is loose and songlike, with a gently rocking alternation of line lengths, as if the speaker is already walking away and turning back. The punctuation is also telling: each stanza ends with an ellipsis followed by an exclamation point, a combination that holds hesitation and urgency together. The vow trails off, yet it is delivered with feeling.
Hayes’s imagery works through natural decay and faint light. The “red and golden leaves” are beautiful but they are falling, and they fall directly onto “my sorrow,” as if time can bury pain under color. The second stanza pushes this further: the present day will be “rotten” and buried in the “grave of yesterdays,” a metaphor that buries time itself. That may sound grim, but it is necessary for the speaker’s plan. He wants the raw present to die and be forgotten before he returns. Then the phrase “before the lamp light dies” introduces a limit, a last warmth before darkness. It suggests that the return will happen while affection or life still glimmers. The most striking phrase, “tear / Of penance,” reframes the other person not as an enemy but as someone who will eventually regret what happened. The speaker offers comfort, not accusation, which makes the promised return both forgiving and quietly powerful.
What makes the poem significant is its emotional reversal. Farewells are often sad or bitter, but “Auf Wiedersehen” transforms goodbye into a pledge of future tenderness. For a school audience, the poem demonstrates how rhyme and repetition can create almost a spell, while the imagery of leaves, graves, and lamplight makes abstract ideas of memory and forgiveness feel physical. Hayes also shows that a Harlem Renaissance poet could work in an intimate lyric mode without ignoring the depth of human experience. The poem’s wisdom lies in its patience: before reconciliation can come, the speaker must allow sorrow to fall, yesterdays to rot, and guilt to bloom into penance. Then the return is not a demand but a gift.