The Child in Spring : Max Picard

Suddenly, the green appears on the trees—as if
The green passed silently from one tree to another.
Children suddenly appear out of the chinks.
They throw their balls high up in the air.  
The child is like a little hill of silence.
Children—little hills of silence—are scattered
Everywhere in the world of words.

Birds  
Throw notes of their song like balls against
The silence, as in a game. The word is led
By silence to the edge of the child’s mouth.  
It is as though each syllable had to detach
Separately from the silence. The child gazes
After its word as it might watch its ball in the air.

—Max Picard (The World of Silence, 1948.)
translated by Stanley Godman, 1952

Excerpt From: "Mornings Like This: Found Poems" by Annie Dillard. Scribd.

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