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# 'The Trees,' by Philip Larkin
- URL: https://joshualore.com/inthemiddleway/the-trees-are-coming-into-leaf-like-something/
- Published: 2016-03-11T14:06:38.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-03T04:22:38.000Z
- Author: Joshua Lore
- Tags: Uncategorized, Philip Larkin, poetry, spring, trees, #Migrated-1788408094757, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-09-03 00:01

> “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 fullgrown thickness every May.  
> Last year is dead, they seem to say,  
> Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.”

—Philip Larkin, ‘*The Trees*’ (photo: It doesn’t feel right sharing a Larkin poem about Spring without a picture of him holding a wicker bunny)