The Frightened Heart

How calmly does the olive branch
observe the sky begin to blanch
without a cry , without a prayer
with no betrayal of despair

Sometime while light obscures
the tree the zenith of its life
will be gone , past , forever
And from thence, a
second history will commence

a chronicle no longer gold
of bargaining with mist and mold
and finally the broken stem
the plummeting to earth , and then

An intercourse not well designed
for beings of a golden kind
whose native green must arch above
the Earth's obscene , corrupting love

And still the ripe fruit and the branch
observe the sky begin to blanch
without a cry , without a prayer
with no betrayal of despair

Oh, courage ! Could you not as well
select a second place to dwell ?
Not only in that golden tree
but in the frightened heart of me ?