| Poems by Women |
AN ORCHARD AT AVIGNON
A. Mary F. Robinson
The hills are white, but not with snow:
They are as
pale in summer time,
For herb or grass may never grow
Upon their slopes of
lime.
Within the circle of the hills
A ring, all flowering in a round,
An
orchard-ring of almond fills
The plot of stony ground.
More fair than happier trees, I think,
Grown in well-watered pasture
land
These parched and stunted branches, pink
Above the stones and sand.
O white, austere, ideal place,
Where very few will care to come,
Where
spring hath lost the waving grace
She wears for us at home!
Fain would I sit and watch for hours
The holy whiteness of thy
hills,
Their wreath of pale auroral flowers,
Their peace the silence
fills.
A place of secret peace thou art,
Such peace as in an hour of pain
One
moment fills the amazed heart,
And never comes again.
From: Stevenson, Burton Egbert.
The Home Book of Verse.
This poet:
[Author index]
This collection assembled by Jone Johnson Lewis.
Collection © 1999-2002 Jone Johnson Lewis.
Citing poems from these pages:
| Author. "Poem Title." Women's History: Poems by Women. Jone Johnson Lewis, editor. URL: (date of logon) |
