Their greenness is a kind of grief.

After you read this Philip Larkin (1922-1985) poem, hear him recite it to you.

“The Trees”

The trees are coming into leaf
Like something almost being said;
The recent buds relax and spread,
Their greenness is a kind of grief.

Is it that they are born again
And we grow old? No, they die too,
Their yearly trick of looking new
Is written down in rings of grain.

Yet still the unresting castles thresh
In fullgrown thickness every May.
Last year is dead, they seem to say,
Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.

they have carried me in their branches

Pulitzer Prize-winning W.S. Merwin was born in New York in 1927 and is currently living in Hawaii after years of traveling the world. He has not only written countless poems with themes ranging from mythology to strong anti-war sentiments but has also done many translations of French, Italian, Latin and  Spanish poetry. Check him out.

Yosemite, 2007.

“Trees”

I am looking at trees
they may be one of the things I will miss
most from the earth
though many of the ones I have seen
already I cannot remember
and though I seldom embrace the ones I see
and have never been able to speak
with one
I listen to them tenderly
their names have never touched them
they have stood round my sleep
and when it was forbidden to climb them
they have carried me in their branches