Rousseau-esque

 What is it we see?

When we walk out in January

The clematis seed in flower

Hanging like ghosts in the woodland bower

Or when the buxom beech, big and round

Its trunk like a tuber growing out of ground

Who’s mighty girth boasts

Of all the minerals it has found

 

Or when the iridescent greens

Strike up as if cymbals of a band

Then in come the greys and hues of blue

That clash and sound the woodland brass stand

 

What can a man find here to satisfy his soul?

Whose natural constituents entertain so droll?

When none of it is of real use

Decaying rotting roots

No good for man or mole

Yet just to stand there

As the shadows play between leaves

And the sun light cuts up in colours

As if the earth from heaven was stole

And catch the sound of a blackbird

Or the hoot of an owl

That is the best of this world

And it gives a place to man’s soul

In it at peace somehow