Poem Against the British, By Robert Bly

I

The wind through the box-elder trees

Is like rides at dusk on a white horse,

Wars for your country, and fighting the British.

II

I wonder if Washington listened to the trees.

All morning I have been sitting in grass,

Higher than my eyes, beneath trees,

And listening upward, to the wind in leaves.

Suddenly I realize there is one thing more:

There is also the wind through the high grass.

III

There are palaces, boats, silence among white buildings,

Iced drinks on marble tops among cool rooms;

It is also good to be poor, and listen to the wind.

From “Contemporary American Poetry,” selected by Donald Hall (NAL Dutton: 288 pp., $10.95)