a poem by rainer maria rilke

Early Spring

Harshness gone.  And sudden mitigation
laid upon the field's uncovered grey.
Little runnels change their intonation.
Tentative caresses stray

round the still earth from immensity.
Roads run far into the land, foretelling.
Unexpectedly you find it, welling
upwards in the empty tree.

translated by J.B. Leishman