Dead Man’s Wood

Osbert Sitwell

In Dead Man’s Wood
The rustling trees
Shiver, shudder
In the breeze.

The bird-song drips
On Dead Man’s Wood
Trickles through
Like falling blood.

And if the sun
Gives forth its light,
The yellow glory
Turns ash-white.

The dark tall trees,
When day is past,
Draw back their leaves,
Pale and aghast.

When rusty shadows
Fall at dusk,
Surely the spirit
Leaves its husk?

All night, all day,
Within this cover,
I sit and wait
For my dead lover.