Cowardice

Discomfort sweeps my quiet as a wind
Leaps at trees and leaves them cold and thinned.
Not that I fear again the mastery
Of winds, for holding my indifference dear
I do not feel illusions stripped from me.
And yet this is a fear —

A fear of old discarded fears, of days
That cried out at irrevocable ways.
I cower for my own old cowardice,
For hours that beat upon the wind's broad breast
With hands as impotent as leaves are; this
Robs my new hour of rest.

I thought my pride had covered long ago
All the old scars, like broken twigs in snow.
I thought to luxuriate in rich decay,
As some far-seeing tree upon a hill;
But startled into shame for an old day
I find that I am but a coward still.