March 26, 1974

The air was soft, the ground still cold.

In wet dull pastures where I strolled

Was something I could not believe.

Dead grass appeared to slide and heave,

Though still too frozen-flat to stir,

And rocks to twitch, and all to blur.

What was this rippling of the land?

Was matter getting out of hand

And making free with natural law?

I stopped and blinked, and then I saw

A fact as eerie as a dream.

There was a subtle flood of stream

Moving upon the face of things.

It came from standing pools and springs

And what of snow was still around;

It came of winter's giving ground

So that the freeze was coming out,

As when a set mind, blessed by doubt,

Relaxes into mother-wit.

Flowers, I said, will come of it.