In A Wook

Thomas Hardy

     Pale beech and pine-tree blue,
        Set in one clay,
     Bough to bough cannot you
        Bide out your day?
     When the rains skim and skip,
     Why mar sweet comradeship,
     Blighting with poison-drip
        Neighborly spray?

     Heart-halt and spirit-lame,
        City-opprest,
     Unto this wood I came
        As to a nest;
     Dreaming that sylvan peace
     Offered the harrowed ease--
     Nature a soft release
        From men's unrest.

     But, having entered in,
        Great growths and small
     Show them to men akin--
        Combatants all!
     Sycamore shoulders oak,
     Bines the slim sapling yoke,
     Ivy-spun halters choke
        Elms stout and tall.

     Touches from ash, O wych,
        Sting you like scorn!
     You, too, brave hollies, twitch
        Sidelong from thorn.
     Even the rank poplars bear
     Illy a rival's air,
     Cankering in black despair
        If overborne.

     Since, then, no grace I find
        Taught me of trees,
     Turn I back to my kind,
        Worthy as these.
     There at least smiles abound,
     There discourse trills around,
     There, now and then, are found
        Life-loyalties.

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