Birches

    When I see birches bend to left and right

    Across the lines of straighter darker trees，

    I like to think some boy's been swinging them.

    But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay

    As ice-storms do.  Often you must have seen them

    Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning

    After a rain.  They click upon themselves

    As the breeze rises， and turn many-colored

    As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.

    Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells

    Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust——

    Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away

    You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.

    They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load，

    And they seem not to break； though once they are bowed

    So low for long， they never right themselves：

    You may see their trunks arching in the woods

    Years afterwards， trailing their leaves on the ground

    Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair

    Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.

    But I was going to say when Truth broke in

    With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm

    I should prefer to have some boy bend them

    As he went out and in to fetch the cows——

    Some boy too far from town to learn baseball，

    Whose only play was what he found himself，

    Summer or winter， and could play alone.

    One by one he subdued his father's trees

    By riding them down over and over again

    Until he took the stiffness out of them，

    And not one but hung limp， not one was left

    For him to conquer.  He learned all there was

    To learn about not launching out too soon

    And so not carrying the tree away

    Clear to the ground.  He always kept his poise

    To the top branches， climbing carefully

    With the same pains you use to fill a cup

    Up to the brim， and even above the brim.

    Then he flung outward， feet first， with a swish，

    Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.

    So was I once myself a swinger of birches.

    And so I dream of going back to be.

    It's when I'm weary of considerations，

    And life is too much like a pathless wood

    Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs

    Broken across it， and one eye is weeping

    From a twig's having lashed across it open.

    I'd like to get away from earth awhile

    And then come back to it and begin over.

    May no fate willfully misunderstand me

    And half grant what I wish and snatch me away

    Not to return.  Earth's the right place for love：

    I don't know where it's likely to go better.

    I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree，

    And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk

    Toward heaven， till the tree could bear no more，

    But dipped its top and set me down again.

    That would be good both going and coming back.

    One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.