Pastorale (by Hart Crane)

Hart Crane
Hart Crane, 1899-1932

Pastorale

No more violets,
And the year
Broken into smoky panels.
What woods remember now
Her calls, her enthusiasms.

The ritual of sap and leaves
The sun drew out,
Ends in this latter muffled
Bronze and brass.  The wind
Takes rein.

If, dusty, I bear
An image beyond this
Already fallen harvest,
I can only query, "Fool—
Have you remembered too long;

Or was there too little said
For ease or resolution—
Summer scarcely begun
And violets,
A few picked, the rest dead?"


* * * *


"Pastorale" was composed circa July 1921 and first published in October 1921
It also appeared in Crane's 1926 collection White Buildings

For an index of Hart Crane poems in the Crisis Chronicles Online Library, click here.

More Hart Crane is available in these volumes from Amazon:

   

 
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