Nearby The sunlight fell upon warm elements, And streams break free in verdant ways, Strands of unreflected echoing joy. Look, tiny flowers, rend the meadow! The mulberries have sealed the laughter Within the rosebush set from traveling winds, That shard from life’s divine—a way, I shall gather thee to speak in whispers, Let us find here the tender wanderer. We clasp the sunlight with our hands And we mimic the rhythms of life and sea. All under the branches where time woveth The scent of distant valleys and paths, Thine own—golden and unmatched! In a warm shadowed vale do we kneel! Even through the light of the sparrow’s flight, Life flourished around.

• Ezra Pound