Poems (Allen)/Time

by Elizabeth Chase Allen

For works with similar titles, see Time.

TIME.

OU see the tree that sweeps my window-pane?
  All the long winter-time it moans and grieves;
In the bleak nights I hear its boughs complain,
Praying for gracious sunshine and warm rain,
  And its withheld inheritance of leaves.

But what avails it? Though the sad tree wears
  Its heart out with its grief, what shall it gain?
Do you believe the tardy summer cares
For all its wild rebukes and passionate prayers,
  Or that the sun shines warmer for its pain?

Verily not. No pleader can prevail
  Who prays against the laws of Time or Fate:
No matter how we murmur and bewail,
The robins will not build in winter hall,
  Nor lilacs blow in February. Wait!

Have faith, my friend. And when these stormy glooms
 Have chastened us for June, come here again,
And yon shall see my tree made glad with blooms,
Its branches all a-toss with purple plumes
  Sweeping across this selfsame window-pause!