Is April cruel if it draws from earth, however hard,
whatever aching thaw, with however contracted labour, some stirring?
How old were you? How young? Not yet unwombed
Crueller, the long past, the waste the words left
Cruel is the month after and a hemisphere after and a century after
The long, long month after the things, failed to be born
the prophecies stilled by wisdom, visions held down and smothered
in the bed of the young men and your daughters' dreams
Then, when leaves took leave,
words had ached and settled.
Now the slow, cruel, whither,
As Autumn passed without the season taking hold