Strong and Patient, New and Old

In dappled green and dappled gold

Your song floats by upon the breeze

This scent of new and fresh and old

It whispers hope of care and ease

From tight within the winter’s grip

While cold cuts spirits like a knife

You wait in patient stewardship

Of silent will, of sleeping life

And when the winter melts away

You’re there to fill the Earth and sky

With testaments to nature’s force

The stubborn beauty they belie

This beating heart that thaws the snow

These woods I love, these woods I know