The Poplar

Claude Monet, Poplars in the Sun, 1891 (detail)

by Logan Pearsall Smith

There is a great tree in Sussex, whose cloud of thin foliage floats high in the summer air. The thrush sings in it, and blackbirds, who fill the late, decorative sunshine with a shimmer of golden sound. There the nightingale finds her green cloister; and on those branches sometimes, like a great fruit, hangs the lemon-colored Moon. In the glare of August, when all the world is faint with heat, there is always a breeze in those cool recesses, always a noise, like the noise of water, among its lightly-hung leaves.

But the owner of this Tree lives in London, reading books.

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About the Author

Logan Pearsall Smith was an American-born British essayist and critic.

Publication Rights

Piece first published in Modern Essays, Selected by Christopher Morley, 1921. Thanks to Project Gutenberg. This essay is now in the public domain.