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Listening

by Amy Lowell, 1912

'T is you that are the music, not your song.
 The song is but a door which, opening wide,
 Lets forth the pent-up melody inside,
Your spirit's harmony, which clear and strong
Sings but of you.  Throughout your whole life long
 Your songs, your thoughts, your doings, each divide
 This perfect beauty; waves within a tide,
Or single notes amid a glorious throng.
 The song of earth has many different chords;
Ocean has many moods and many tones
 Yet always ocean.  In the damp Spring woods
The painted trillium smiles, while crisp pine cones
 Autumn alone can ripen.  So is this
 One music with a thousand cadences.

Published in A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass
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