The Trembling of the Veil

Today out the window

the trees semed like live

organisms on the moon.

Each bough extended upward

covered at the north end

with leaves, like a green

hairy protuberance. I saw

the scarlet-and-pink shoot-tips

of budding leaves wave

delicately in the sunlight,

blown by the breeze,

all the arms of the trees

bending and straining downward

at once when the wind

pushed them.

Paterson, August 1948