Soft sunlight, gray-blue smoky air,
Wet thawing snows on hillsides bare;
Loud streams, moist sodden earth; below
Quick seedlings stir, rich juices flow
Through frozen veins of rigid wood,
And the whole forest bursts in bud.
No longer stark the branches spread
An iron network overhead,
Albeit naked still of green;
Through this soft, lustrous vapor seen,