William Carlos Williams. The Widow's Lament in Springtime. Harriet Monroe, ed. Poetry: A Magazine of Verse. 1912-22

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). Poetry: A Magazine of Verse. 1912–22.

The Widow’s Lament in Springtime

By William Carlos Williams


SORROW is my own yard
where the new grass
flames as it has flamed
often before, but not
with the cold fire	5
that closes round me this year.
Thirty-five years
I lived with my husband.
The plum tree is white today
with masses of flowers.	10
Masses of flowers
load the cherry branches
and color some bushes
yellow and some red,
but the grief in my heart	15
is stronger than they,
for though they were my joy
formerly, today I notice them
and turn away forgetting.
Today my son told me	20
that in the meadows,
at the edge of the heavy woods
in the distance, he saw
trees of white flowers.
I feel that I would like	25
to go there
and fall into those flowers
and sink into the marsh near them.