The Tree Beside the Sea
We met by the sea
In the billowing greens
By the hanging tree
Where a body was seen
Swaying in summer breezes;
In the tree by the sea
Where the body hung
In the loving change of season,
And no angels sung
The day she died for the world to see
Up in the tree
Among the branches
By the sea.
We met on a golden day,
Long before the fall of night,
And on that day we met,
She said to me
“I loved you in the fall
And I loved you in the spring,
But come unsung winter’s lonely nights
We’ll find we were not meant to be.”
As cryptic as it sounded
It was music to my ears
And for the first time,
After all these years,
I thought myself anything but alone.
We met in summertime,
With thundering silence to keep us warm,
And the hearts of hundreds wept that day,
For I were the one
To take her away,
And now a body hangs
Among the branches
Of the hanging tree.
A lifeless lovely lady
Lies lowly in the breeze,
Her body dancing to the waving of the sea,
Unlike the way
She danced with me
When I loved her,
And she loved me.