Winter secrets by Karle Wilson Baker

GOD wrote my heart a letter, I believe,
And used the branches of the naked trees
Against the winter sky, for characters.
I cannot translate into mortal words
The dainty hieroglyphics of the elm,
The oracles in oak, the willow’s rhyme.
Nor any of the lovely dialects
That write themselves across the setting sun.
But, like some tonsured pedant of old time
Who wooed his dimming parchment like a bride,
And pored upon it, yearning, day and night.
So, year by year, I take my lesson up.
And dream out little meanings, one by one,
Writ in the margin of God’s manuscript.