"The trees are coming into leaf / Like something almost being said"

by Philip Larkin

The trees are coming into leaf
Like something almost being said;
The recent buds relax and spread,
Their greenness is a kind of grief.

Is it that they are born again
And we grow old? No, they die too,
Their yearly trick of looking new
Is written down in rings of grain.

Yet still the unresting castles thresh
In fullgrown thickness every May.
Last year is dead, they seem to say,
Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.

*

From High Windows by Philip Larkin, Faber & Faber, 2015. First published in The Listener, 1963.

Find the tree nearest to you and approach it as you would a friend you hunger to hear the news about. A friend you want to share a frequency with.

This tree has been storing observations to share with you, and is also eagerly anticipating your presence.

Sap tea is brewing. Birds’ eggs are balanced in their stick nests, growing. The hour has come.

What do you tell the tree about? What does the tree tell you?

Listen and write.

A song of frequencies I love:

Art 1: The Charlemagne, Oak Tree with an Eagle’s Nest, Eugène Stanislas Alexandre Bléry French, 1845

Art 2: Cranes, Pines, and Bamboo, Ogata Kōrin Japanese, early 18th century

Art 3: Pectoral and Necklace of Sithathoryunet with the Name of Senwosret II, Middle Kingdom, ca. 1887–1878 B.C., public domain.