In April

In April, the world is fresh, the sun soft, skies cool and gray. April is my month. I love nothing more than listening to birds as they flit from tree to tree, listening to the rain, seeing trees budding. Here is Rilke for your April afternoon:


In April
Rainer Maria Rilke
Again the woods are odorous, the lark
Lifts on upsoaring wings the heaven gray
That hung above the tree-tops, veiled and dark, 
Where branches bare disclosed the empty day. 
After long rainy afternoons an hour 
Comes with its shafts of golden light and flings 
Them at the windows in a radiant shower, 
And rain drops beat the panes like timorous wings. 
Then all is still. The stones are crooned to sleep
By the soft sound of rain that slowly dies; 
And cradled in the branches, hidden deep
In each bright bud, a slumbering silence lies.
This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on April 5, 2020, by the Academy of American Poets.
Photo from Premier Tree Solutions

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