PALE beech and pine-tree blue, Set in one clay, Bough to bough cannot you Bide out your day? When the rains skim and skip, Why mar sweet comradeship, Blighting with poison-drip Neighborly spray? Heart-halt and spirit-lame, City-opprest, Unto this wood I came As to a nest; Dreaming that sylvan peace Offered the harrowed ease -- Nature a soft release From men's unrest. But, having entered in, Great growths and small Show them to men akin -- Combatants all! Sycamore shoulders oak, Bines the slim sapling yoke, Ivy-spun halters choke Elms stout and tall. Touches from ash, O wych, Sting you like scorn! You, too, brave hollies, twitch Sidelong from thorn. Even the rank poplars bear Illy a rival's air, Cankering in black despair If overborne. Since, then, no grace I find Taught me of trees, Turn I back to my kind, Worthy as these. There at least smiles abound, There discourse trills around, There, now and then, are found Life-loyalties. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SECOND BOOK OF AIRS: SONG 12 by THOMAS CAMPION AMORETTI: 37 by EDMUND SPENSER PATROLING BARNEGAT by WALT WHITMAN SEVEN SAD SONNETS: 4. SHE REMEMBERS by MARY REYNOLDS ALDIS THE ARGONAUTS (ARGONATUICA): MEDEA'S PARTING WORDS by APOLLONIUS RHODIUS |