Here at high morning lingers the white moon,
Thin as a snow-flower, while the rowan tree
Holds its tight scarlet berries on the blue.
What is the meaning striving to break through?
Something is being said—
The heart besieged by beauty feels the red
Audible, almost, on the intent sky.
These suddenly ardent trees,
What are they saying?
This halleluiah maple swaying
Like a young prophet
In a mountain breeze?
This gloria oak, bronze as a great chime,
Intoning some dark loyalty to time?
Something is being said—
This is no mourning over summer dead,
This chant in ochre, amber, purple, red.
Chromatic syllables are being made,
The earth is shouting upward, “Unafraid!”
Yet dimly through the triumph, the mind knows—
Shares with the cold descending leaf—
Far off the inevitable advent of the snows.
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