Poems (Cromwell)/The Breath

by Gladys Cromwell

THE BREATH

A trembling crest
Of smoke, the winter sky
Congeals to bloom,
To please a poet's eye:

A slender reed
Arisen from some gold
Recess or womb
Of flame to spaces cold.

Between the twigs,
That for a nest are spun
On flight's grey loom,
A sapphire thread may run:

And so between the grey,
The woven boughs of trees.
A little plume
Of mist. the poet sees;

It will suffice—
Too scant a breath to name—
For him to whom
It signifies a flame.