Page:The Pot of Earth.pdf/21

 The stem lay limp and heavy in her hand And cold, and the leaves felt lifeless. And that night She put it by her bed. She could not sleep, Feeling the dead thing by her bed, feeling The slow fingers feeling, feeling the earth Divided by the fingers of the grass, Of trees, of flowers, by the pressing fingers Of grass pierced, feeling the earth pierced And the limp stalk flowering—she could not sleep—

One night it rained with a south wind and a warm Smell of thawed earth and rotting straw and ditches Sodden with snow and running full. She lay