“White Morning” by W.S. Merwin

On nights toward the end of summer and age of mist
        has gathered in the oaks the box thickets the straggling
eglantines it has moved like a hand unable to believe
        the face it touches over the velvet of wild thyme
and the vetches sinking with the weight of dew it has found
        its way without sight into the hoofprints of cows
the dark nests long empty the bark hanging along the narrow
        halls among stones and has held it all in a cloud
unseen the whole night as in a mind where I came
        when it was turning white and I was holding a thin
wet branch wrapped in lichens because all I had thought
        I knew had to be passed from branch to branch through the empty
sky and whatever I reached then and could recognize
        moved toward me out of the cloud and was still the sky
where I went on looking until I was standing on
        the wide wall along the lane to the hazel grove
where we went one day to cut handles that would last
        the crows were calling around me to white air
I could hear their wings dripping and hear small birds with lights
        breaking in their tongues the cold soaked through me I was able
after that morning to believe stories that once
        would have been closed to me I saw a carriage go under
the oaks there in the full day and vanish I watched animals there
        I sat with friends in the shade they have all disappeared
most of the stories have to do with vanishing