It was the custom of my tribe to be silent, to think the song inwardly, tune and word so beautiful they could be only held, not sung; held and heard in quietness while walking the end of the field where birches make a grove, or standing by the rail in back of the library in some northern city, or in the long dream of a tower of gothic stoniness; and always we were alone. Yet sometimes two heard it, two separately together. It could come nearby in the shadow of a pine bough on the snow, or high in the orchestral lights, or maybe (this was our miracle) it would have no intermediary -- a suddenness, indivisible, unvoiced. Used with the permission of Copper Canyon Press, P.O. Box 271, Port Townsend, WA 98368-0271, www.cc.press.org | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...GENEVIEVE AND ALEXANDRA (2) by EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON THE VISION OF JUDGEMENT by GEORGE GORDON BYRON THE FRIEND OF HUMANITY AND THE KNIFE-GRINDER by GEORGE CANNING LIBERTINE by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN THE SINNER by MARGARET E. BRUNER THAT GRAY, COLD CHRISTMAS DAY (DECEMBER 25, 1620) by HEZEKIAH BUTTERWORTH |