Egrets

Once as I travelled through a quiet evening,

I saw a pool, jet-black and mirror-still.

Beyond, the slender paperbarks stood crowding;

each on its own white image looked its fill,

and nothing moved but thirty egrets wading -

thirty egrets in a quiet evening.

Once in a lifetime, lovely past believing,

your lucky eyes may light on such a pool.

As though for many years I had been waiting,

I watched in silence, till my heart was full

of clear dark water, and white trees unmoving,

and, whiter yet, those thirty egrets wading.