Palisade Pine! that gave us lands,
Thrusting thy feet in the flowing sands,
Holding the bar till it was our own —
Why dost thou ever moan and moan?

Is it because Thou wert mountain bred,
In the heavens Thy dark green head,
Growing Thy seed in the crushed sandstone,
That, in our levels, Thou makest moan?

Thou art higher than all our hills,
Soaring above our humble wills!
Straight Thy spine, till Thou seemest flown
'Mongst the birds in an upper zone.

Still Thou repinest, Pine so high!
Halted just short of the weeping sky,
Stemming the rush of the wild cyclone:
Pine, what makest Thee moan and moan?

Hast Thou root in too shallow land,
Needing Thee spread for Thy naked stand,
Need of wide feet to arise alone,
That in Thy tower Thou makest moan?

Carpeted under Thee, brown Thy shats,
Like an Indian chief with mats;
Clean Thy shade of Thy stems and cone,
Childless, Thy royalty making moan.

Where Thou moanest we cannot reach
To Thy pulpit, to hear Thee preach;
Only a branch we annual see,
Grave and gay, in the Christmas tree.

When we are saddened, astray, alone,
Comforting, brother, is Thy still moan!
Seeming to say from our loved ones flown
Murmurs above in their telephone!

Once I knew a stature like Thine,
Stately trunk as the glorious Pine,
Rich brunette, she was dark and fair,
Pale sky eyes and Thy waving hair.

Something too lofty for our soil,
Far away from our day's turmoil,
High, ineffable, dreaming, alone,
Aye she walked in Zenobia's zone.

Lover nor conqueror climbed to her
Fruitless, yielding but cone and burr;
Left by time, though to wedlock prone,
Stately she stood with a soul in moan.

Set in opinion like the Pine,
Drawing everything but the vine,
Elegant, glorious, she like Its sigh,
Featured the Pine with its head in the sky.

Then, in a night, was the lady wrecked,
Wild the luxuriant intellect:
There was a taint in the brain and bone. —
Hear in the midnight the Pine tree moan!