From Word To Word

The poems that I most need to be poems are always the ones that disappoint me most, and I very much need this poem to be a poem, not for myself but for another, and I only hope that he is less dissatisfied with it than I am.

The Tree Trembles

The tree trembles beneath the axe’s blow,
But its strength is sound, and its roots are deep,
And its heartwood is true, and it stands firm,
Stands a moment more proudly than it did,
Because it soon must fall, because the bright axe
Has whispered to it from the whetstone’s edge
That its time approaches, but still it stands,
Not to defy, but to fall from its height.