328

The maples at the back of the house
Are flowering, weightless green flowers,
Green of a new wheatear : light colour
That the silent air seems to lift before it.

The sun beams in through the new leaves
And the loose flowerheads, a presence
Without presence, a substance of song.
The dark of the tree falls away from them,

Black veinlike joists grafted to thicker
Vessels, thick tangents. The branches are
As tributaries joining to a greater course.
Below the soil, the roots form a vast delta.

White sediment of cloud drifts in the far
Distance, as borne on the slow stream.
It would seem to break at each instant,
And its particles flow out across a falls.

In the shade of the tree a white birdhouse,
Small, with a green roof. A bird passes
The aperture—holds still. It is a presence
Without presence. It passes from itself.