Under the Oak 🌳 YOU, if you were sensible, When I tell you the stars flash signals, each one dreadful, You would not turn and answer me “The night is wonderful.” 🌳 Even you, if you knew How this darkness soaks me through and through, and infuses Unholy fear in my vapour, you would pause to distinguish What hurts, from what amuses. 🌳 For I tell you Beneath this powerful tree, my whole soul’s fluid Oozes away from me as a sacrifice steam At the knife of a Druid. 🌳 Again I tell you, I bleed, I am bound with withies, My life runs out. I tell you my blood runs out on the floor of this oak, Gout upon gout. 🌳 Above me springs the blood-born mistletoe In the shady smoke. But who are you, twittering to and fro Beneath the oak? 🌳 What thing better are you, what worse? What have you to do with the mysteries Of this ancient place, of my ancient curse? What place have you in my histories? #undertheoak #dhlawrence #poem #🌳 (at Annaba, Algeria)