White April

The orchard is a pool, wherein I drown;

It is a very pool of loveliness.
I clutch the edge of a white world and press
To the bottomless white billows down and down:
I clutch, I gasp, and all at once each spring
That I have known comes sharply to my mind,
Passes before me, and each one I find,
Stirs in me a packed, swift remembering.
Oh, pear-trees, ancient by an ancient lane,
A hundred at the delicate white start,
Tall waves that roll and break upon a shore!
I struggle up, I am myself again:
Dripping with April, April to the heart,
I run back to the house, and bolt the door!

WHITE APRIL by Lizette Woodworth Reese circa 1930