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Nor’-West Evening, Winter

Between the purple canopy of cloud-mass
And indistinguishable density of earth-form
A space, at evening, of pale yellow, sunlit;
Inscribed most delicately upon it
The black reticulation of a naked hawthorn.

I was aware, then, of a thicker darkness
Blotting the shadow of my bitten picture—
The breathing presence of a stocky heifer
Browsing beside me in a richer twilight.

Accord I knew with the confederate creature
Fellow-agisted on small star for sustenance;
In common, we, upon earth’s mercies pensionary;
But my convenient food in that hour was a construction
Of cloud-mass darkly overhanging light-rift,
And the black latticed twigs of a bare hawthorn
Printed most exquisitely upon it.