Looking upon this tree with its quaint pretension <br />Of holding the earth, a leveret, in its claws, <br />Or marking the texture of its living bark, <br />A grey sea wrinkled by the winds of years, <br />I understand whence this man's body comes, <br />In veins and fibres, the bare boughs of bone, <br />The trellised thicket, where the heart, that robin, <br />Greets with a song the seasons of the blood. <br /> <br />But where in meadow or mountain shall I match <br />The individual accent of the speech <br />That is the ear's familiar? To what sun attribute <br />The honeyed warmness of his smile? <br />To which of the deciduous brood is german <br />The angel peeping from the latticed eye? <br /> <br /> <br />Submitted by Andrew Mayers<br /><br />Ronald Stuart Thomas<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/an-old-man/
