As in the deep Satisfaction of dark sleep The tree her dream dreamed on, And woke to feel the wind's arms round her thrown And her head rock.
And the wind raught Her ageing boughs and caught Her body fast again. Then in one agony of age, grief, pain, She fell and died.
Her noble height, Branches that loved the light, Her music and cool shade, Her memories and all of her is dead On the hill side.
But the wind stooped, With madness tired, and drooped In the soft valley and slept, While morning strangely round the hush'd tree crept And called in vain.
The birds fed where The roots uptorn and bare Thrust shameful at the sky; And pewits round the tree would dip and cry With the old pain.
'Ten o'clock's gone!' Said sadly every one. And mothers looking thought Of sons and husbands far away that fought:-- And looked again.
[Footnote 1: "Ten o'clock" is the name of a tall tree that crowned the eastern Cotswolds.]
In the hush of early even The clouds came flocking over, Till the last wind fell from heaven And no bird cried.
Darkly the clouds were flocking, Shadows moved and deepened, Then paused; the poplar's rocking Ceased; the light hung still
Like a painted thing, and deadly. Then from the cloud's side flickered Sharp lightning, thrusting madly At the cowering fields.
Thrice the fierce cloud lighten'd, Down the hill slow thunder trembled Day in her cave grew frightened, Crept away, and died.
How near I walked to Love, How long, I cannot tell. I was like the Alde that flows Quietly through green level lands, So quietly, it knows Their shape, their greenness and their shadows well; And then undreamingly for miles it goes And silently, beside the sea.
Seamews circle over, The winter wildfowl wings, Long and green the grasses wave Between the river and the sea. The sea's cry, wild or grave, From bank to low bank of the river rings; But the uncertain river though it crave The sea, knows not the sea.
Was that indeed salt wind? Came that noise from falling Wild waters on a stony shore? Oh, what is this new troubling tide Of eager waves that pour Around and over, leaping, parting, recalling?... How near I moved (as day to same day wore) And silently, beside the sea!
Thy hand my hand, Thine eyes my eyes, All of thee Caught and confused with me: My hand thy hand, My eyes thine eyes, All of me Sunken and discovered anew in thee....