IN the choir the boys are singing
the hymn.
The morning light
on their lips
Moves
in silver-moist flashes, in musical trim.
Sudden outside the high window, one
crow
Hangs in the
air
And lights on a
withered oak-tree’s top of woe.
One bird, one blot, folded and still
at the top
Of the withered
tree! — in the grail
Of crystal heaven falls one full black
drop.
Like a soft full drop of darkness it
seems to sway
In the tender
wine
Of our Sabbath,
suffusing our sacred day.