1630 Nature poems

Coleridge carefully wrote down a whole page of them, all beginning with the letter b. Guidebooks preserve our knowledge of their hues and shapes, their breeding. Many poems have made delicate word-chimes— like wind-chimes not for wind but for the breath of man— out of their lovely names. At the edge of the prairie in a cabin when thunder comes closer to thump the roof hard a few of them—in a corner, brittle in a dry jar where a woman’s thoughtful hand left them to fade— seem to blow with the announcing winds outside as the rain begins to fall on all their supple kin of all colors, under a sky of one color, or none.

All the trees kept their own counsel without any wind to speak of, until one lone limber pine began gesticulating wildly, as if it suffered from its own inner cyclone. It was like a lunatic in the courtroom of other trees. We forgot about the sunset and the dark coming on across the plain. Then the reason appeared: a mother antelope had twin newborns backed into the tree and fended off a pair of coyotes who darted in and feinted out, knowing she couldn't defend them both. The girl I was with shrieked, "Do something!" I thought of the rifle back at the house. I thought of a litter of coyote whelps in a den somewhere nearby. I thought of the three-hundred-yard sprint to the tree. The mother antelope would be first to bolt, and those coyotes would have the aplomb to make off with both twins. I said no. The antelope struck out with her forelegs, she butted the coyotes back, until one of them got the chance they had orchestrated and caught a twin and trotted off, dangling it by the nape as gently as if it were her own.

Out along the last curve in the brick walk the grass has begun to green, with the freezing cold and coming snow its certain fate. The cranes make the same mistake, fields of red capped heads attest their arrival just before the worst blizzard of winter makes it impossible to tell the field from the river. And we, too, have known these mortal mishaps, miscalculated our time, found ourselves out of step, arriving too early, staying on too late, misjudging the nearness, the vengeance of the storm. The cranes, the grass, they tell us: this can go on for millions of years.

But it is not always quiet here. Things go on while we sleep the sleep of soldiers. Ancient branches crack and splinter into dust. Large wings snap open in spring like carpets splayed out over the railing. Granite splits apart at the seams and great animals cleave roads through woods. Daily, in the density, there is life on the edge of the knife that cuts the world into hemispheres of sense and death. Trees are born and die, bones turn to humus, glaciers to meadowland. It is time to turn yourself loose, like new leaves, like big lakes on which swim enormous birds at a distance deeper in breadth than the water's depth. Their shadows pull you to the shore. Their size fills your lungs with sky. It is time to heave aside the boulders and the dams, to come back out like a bear after the thaw, to be ready for the forest, for the forage, for the full and waning moons. You will get soaked in wet grass, feel the insects pierce your skin. You will learn to balance between gravity and light. There will be hot and sticky nights, sharp songs at dawn, long and bright ineffable days. This is your chance to crash your way through underbrush unlocking like so many doors.

My garden is the wild Sea of the grass. Her garden Shelters between walls. The tide could break in; I should be sorry for this. There is peace there of a kind, Though not the deep peace Of wild places. Her care For green life has enabled The weak things to grow. Despite my first love, I take sometimes her hand, Following straight paths Between flowers, the nostril Clogged with their thick scent. The old softness of lawns Persuading the slow foot Leads to defection; the silence Holds with its gloved hand The wild hawk of the mind. But not for long, windows, Opening in the trees Call the mind back To its true eyrie; I stoop Here only in play.

Thou sorrow, venom Elfe: Is this thy play, To spin a web out of thyselfe To Catch a Fly? For Why? I saw a pettish wasp Fall foule therein: Whom yet thy Whorle pins did not clasp Lest he should fling His sting. But as affraid, remote Didst stand hereat, And with thy little fingers stroke And gently tap His back. Thus gently him didst treate Lest he should pet, And in a froppish, aspish heate Should greatly fret Thy net. Whereas the silly Fly, Caught by its leg Thou by the throate tookst hastily And 'hinde the head Bite Dead. This goes to pot, that not Nature doth call. Strive not above what strength hath got, Lest in the brawle Thou fall. This Frey seems thus to us. Hells Spider gets His intrails spun to whip Cords thus And wove to nets And sets. To tangle Adams race In's stratigems To their Destructions, spoil'd, made base By venom things, Damn'd Sins. But mighty, Gracious Lord Communicate Thy Grace to breake the Cord, afford Us Glorys Gate And State. We'l Nightingaile sing like When pearcht on high In Glories Cage, thy glory, bright, And thankfully, For joy.

If ever the sweet spring comes, I’ll put aside these dead books And try to feel the herbage freshen Along the withered boughs of old dry thoughts. I’ll walk out somewhere where a garden grows, And there I’ll stand some summer evening, Hat beside elbows on the gray stone wall, And the wind will stir, coming from behind the hill. Afterward I’ll walk home, hands behind me, And pause a moment before going in, Half fancying some one has called my name, Or been awakened to a flutter as I passed. Of course, I’ll enter, but leave the door ajar, For someone might come in, you know, Expectantly I’ll sit to fancy the long evening through That a pair of eyes in the summer night Might light a candle in the dull world, So softly that none might see to smile at, Yet ardently enough—like a vestal candle burning— For a little heat in a cold house.

When the wind invades the treetops and the trees agree, shivering take me, take me, when their stealthy perfume drifts down to waft among mortals, they come out in droves: the boy whose bouncing keys speak a language all their own, the novice who gets her tricks from magazine molls (their haughtiness, swirl of cleats), the gigolo with eyes lowered, the better to judge his prey, the woman whose hemlines rise as her age does, the bad girl whose only remaining option is to get worse: despite the string of cheats and lukewarm reactions, she still has the power to pound, the knack of funneling her frustration into the arrogant click of a heel . . . at this armada of proud, unyielding soldiers I have cast ferocious stones, holding forth on barricaded gardens and souls’ communion until, heaving my bones from garret to gutter I took to the street and saw it, too, was worthy. Chasers out for a good time, flirters in for a life’s catch, strutters so skilled your lurid designs burn holes, kill the cold in the pavement, it does not matter what fever you feed, so long as you feed it freely; I hid my eyes but sickness is catching; lovers, permit me entrance.

Useless! Useless! —heavy rain driving into the sea

A working river, a working valley, The gray-green Rhône Lined with workings, heaps of dust, gravel, cement, And log jams waiting for transport, Like the island exporting itself to its neighbors one barge at a time. The river, the road, and the railway, A plait, a tangle, a place of through. The river not navigable, the boggy valley floor not walkable, The locals came down from the mountains a little way To site castles on moraine and regulate trade. Hannibal marched his elephants through here, dynamited rocks with vinegar. Poplars were planted en passant by Napoleon’s Grande Armée Two-hundred-some years ago. Goethe came to visit. The shade endures. Rilke was reminded of Spain. He lived among apricots at Muzot, Just the other side of the language barrier, And fixed to be buried with a view of France. No one knows who I am, were his dying words. Smells of hay and dung, the murmurs of subtle conversation Next door are tax-efficient sheep The underground chicken palace like CERN Or a discreet gun emplacement. The lights come on when we appear, and go off after we’re gone. Larchwood and rye bread, chocolate and slate, Dried beef and stone All one striated substance, The staff of life breaking explosively, crumblingly, If it breaks at all, A stash of daunting verticals, A washing machine delivered by helicopter Winched down into the Renaissance casbah. Time was a man had to carry his donkey across his shoulders up a cliff; Now everything is tunnel fodder. Electricity and water come piped through the mountains, The vineyards get a sousing under great rainbow arcs, Who wouldn’t want to die in a thirteenth-century tower With light sensors and cold running water Off the hills and a chill in the sunny air of the contemporary archaic.