In dark weather

Against the gaunt, brown-purple hill

The bright brown oak is wide and bare;

A pale-brown flock is feeding there --

Contented, still.

No bracken lights the bleak hill-side;

No leaves are on the branches wide;

No lambs across the fields have cried;

-- Not yet.

But whorl by whorl the green fronds climb;

The ewes are patient till their time;

The warm buds swell beneath the rime --

For life does not forget.