Some Trees by John Ashbery

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Some Trees
John Ashbery

These are amazing: each
Joining a neighbor, as though speech
Were a still performance.
Arranging by chance

To meet as far this morning
From the world as agreeing
With it, you and I
Are suddenly what the trees try

To tell us we are:
That their merely being there
Means something; that soon
We may touch, love, explain.

And glad not to have invented
Such comeliness, we are surrounded:
A silence already filled with noises,
A canvas on which emerges

A chorus of smiles, a winter morning.
Placed in a puzzling light, and moving,
Our days put on such reticence
These accents seem their own defense.

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This poem appeared in The Mooring Of Starting Out by John Ashbery, published by Ecco Press, 1997. Shared here with profound gratitude.

Read more works by John Ashbery • Find books by this poet • Or view my library

Explore poems in pursuit of: nature • tenderness • living • Or browse the index

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