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Home  »  Poetry: A Magazine of Verse  »  Charles R. Murphy

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

Spring

Charles R. Murphy

From “Growth”

TREES have a gesture of departure,

Yet forever stay;

Into what eager land they’d travel

No man may say.

In the spring they stand on tip-toe;

Yet, self-willed, remain

In autumn to let earthward

Their hopes like rain.

Yet forever a new spring cometh,

And their muteness swells

To the voice of one long risen

For long farewells;

Who with steps of eternal patience,

In eternal quest,

Would venture a truth too lofty

To be expressed;

Whose heart at times is burdened,

When no dream consoles,

With a heritage too mighty

For rooted souls.