Lost Elms

  O if we but knew what we do
         When we delve or hew —
     Hack and rack the growing green!
          Since country is so tender
     To touch, her being só slender,
     That, like this sleek and seeing ball
     But a prick will make no eye at all,
     Where we, even where we mean
                 To mend her we end her,
            When we hew or delve:
After-comers cannot guess the beauty been.
  Ten or twelve, only ten or twelve
     Strokes of havoc unselve
           The sweet especial scene,
     Rural scene, a rural scene,
     Sweet especial rural scene.


from Binsey Poplars, by Gerard Manley Hopkins


The last couple of weeks there has been a detour around Somesville while several old elm trees were removed, apparently due to disease. This is terribly sad for so many reasons. They were such beautiful and distinctive trees - real landmarks.

The island is very rocky, and predominantly spruce, fir, and pine. White pines grow large here, but not so much else. Deciduous trees do not grow with the abundance of evergreens, and large ones are not very common. 

I hope the one remaining - I understood the original idea was to remove all of them - will recover in time and become a stately old giant. Truthfully, I fear what the upcoming winter storms might do now that it stands alone.

after comers cannot guess the beauty been