The Trees by Philip Larkin

The trees are coming into leaf
Like something almost being said
The recent buds relax and spread
Their greenness is a kind of grief.

Is it that they are born again
And we grow old? No, they die too
Their yearly trick of looking new
Is written down in rings of grain

Yet still the unresting castles thresh
In full grown thickness every May
Last year is dead, they seem to say
Begin afresh, afresh, afresh

(c) Philip Larkin 1967