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I 

PLANTING 

If I could give to you a dew-wrapped day, 
You have no need to tell me — I should know 
That you would use it all to make things grow. 
The furling bud, the fruiting branch are pay 
More than enough for loam from stubborn clay. 
If noon wilted or harsh rains turned to snow, 
If whir of locusts darkened skies to mow 
Earth naked — plant again. Thus you would say. 

But love, our love, can have no second root. 
We gardened well and won a tall white flower 
From a bud that burgeoned from a bitter shoot 
Rooted in sullen soil. Let come no hour 
When we neglect to guard that tall bright tree 
Whose harvesting must be our destiny. 

II

BLIGHT 

August is the month of broken dreams: 
The amber pear splits in the grass, worm-eaten; 
The fish drift sideways in the shrunken streams; 
And in the fields the fecund shocks lie beaten 
With hail. What are those puny stalks of gray 
Seen through a midday dusk of drifting soil? 
Listen! The crickets work on stubbled hay, 
And canker takes the perfect rose as spoil. 

And I who kept my body for this fruiting, 
Know now the wandering seed can find no rest — 
Part of the waste of August’s heavy looting, 
Part of the waste of nature’s heavy jest. 
September, can your gentler hands redeem 
The scattered fragments of the broken dream? 

III

BIRTH 

Let this then sober you about to wed: 
Your loins and hers are living woof and warp 
For special patterning. That tilt of head, 
The tall bone, the laugh-closed eye, the sharp 
Strength of hand — lovers made these belong 
To us. Through them still other lovers sent 
Our strand of silver words, our love of song — 
Once more designing new experiment. 

Let this then sober you about to wed: 
That pattern, broken, now begins anew; 
Here is the snapping of the ragged thread, 
The family pattern rent of us and you. 
Yet part of you goes with us past your place, 
And Mother looks again from your son’s face.