Spring
——
To what purpose, April, do you return
Again? Bare branches and the black
1on the ground
Have opened your strange beauty to the sun;
’told me it was to see you here
Again in the spring.

I know no joy in this small hour.
All this beauty and I
Do not feel the wind stir;
I see the trees and hear the fallen rain—
The suffering beauty of the earth—
And how I pray in my heart, that I am in the world
And can share this day.

• Edna St Vincent Millay