Me on the shores of icy lakes,
In stands of unkempt spruce
With moss and undergrowth and no one
Singing but a whitethroat,
Where a road sign north reads home,
And spring is a month of snow.

You in a Sunday world of hot siesta streets,
A cool pineta with its stray dogs,
Old men playing cards,
And restless cousins lying about girls,
Where spring is a place on a mountain slope
Above the town,
A shepherd comes to drink.

And when the sap begins to rise,
Me in a sugar bush
Of strait backed maples, swelling buds,
And vats of syrup simmering,
Tray of drizzled snow in mittened hands,
And a Saxon soul,
That makes me swallow all the untouched white
Before I taste the sweet.

You in your grandfather’s garden,
Those trees, your sisters
With their taut and slender limbs
Pouring their milk
Into the warm breasts of figs,
You, knowing with your tongue
Their fine blue skin,
Their sex,
How they swell and soften,
Like shadows,
Like sleep.