All Day I Was With Trees

Across wild country on solitary roads
Within a fugue of parting, I was consoled
By birches sovereign whiteness in sad woods,
Dark glow of pines, a single elm's distinction -
I was consoled by trees.

In February we see the structure change -
Or the light change, and so the way we see it.
Tensile and delicate, the trees stand now
Against the early skies, the frail fresh blue,
In an attentive stillness.

Naked, the trees are singularly present,
Although their secret force is locked in
Who could believe that the new sap is rising
And soon we shall draw up amazing sweetness
From stark maples??

All day I was with trees, a fugue of parting,
All day I lived in long cycles, not brief hours.
A tenderness of light before new falls of snow
Lay on the barren landscape like a new promise.
Love nourished every vein.

May Sarton