Wood and Stones
The silent trees above my head
The silent pathway at my feet
Shame me when here I dare to tread
Accompanied by thoughts unmeet.
"Alas!" they seem to say "have we
In speechless patience travailed long
Only at last to bring forth thee,
A creature void of speech or song ?
"Only in thee can Nature know
Herself, find utterance and a tongue
To tell her rapture and her woe,
And yet of her thou hast not sung.
"Thy mind with trivial notions rife
Beholds the pomp of night and day,
The winds and clouds and seas at strife,
Uncaring, and hath naught to say."
O Man, with destiny so great,
With years so few to make it good,
Such fooling in the eyes of fate
May well give speech to stones and wood!
~~
John Cowper Powys (1872-1963)
from Poems, 1899
[Poem is in the public domain in Canada and the United States]
John Cowper Powys biography
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