Even in the Moment

Even in the moment of our earliest kiss,

When sighed the straitened bud into the flower,

Sat the dry seed of most unwelcome this;

And that I knew, thought not the day and hour.

Too season-wise am I, being country-bred,

To tilt at autumn or defy the frost:

Snuffing the chill even as my fathers did,

I say with them, "What's out tonight is lost."

I only hoped, with the mild hope of all

Who watch the leaf take shape upon the tree,

A fairer summer and a later fall

Than in these parts a man is apt to see,

And sunny clusters ripened for the wine:

I tell you this across the blackened vine.