poem

The Maple Tree — Sep 17, 2026

John Clare

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The maple with its tassel flowers of green,
That turns to red a staghorn-shaped seed,
Just spreading out its scolloped leaves is seen,
Of yellowish hue, yet beautifully green;
Bark ribbed like corderoy in seamy screed,
That farther up the stem is smoother seen,
Where the white hemlock with white umbel flowers
Up each spread stoven to the branches towers;
And moss around the stoven spreads, dark green,
And blotched leaved orchis, and the blue bell flowers;
Thickly they grow and neath the leaves are seen;
I love to see them gemmed with morning hours,
I love the lone green places where they be,
And the sweet clothing of the maple tree.

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📖 About this poem

This little sonnet is Clare doing what he does best: looking hard at one unremarkable tree until it becomes remarkable. He builds the maple from the ground up, almost botanically, tassel flowers, staghorn seed, ribbed bark like corduroy, then lets the eye wander outward to the hemlock, moss, orchis, and bluebells crowded at its feet. The form is loose sonnet, but Clare bends it to his own breathless rhythm, piling clause on clause with "and," "and," "and," as if the sentence itself can't stop noticing things. The corduroy bark is the standout image, a homely, tactile comparison that makes the tree feel touchable. What still lands is the sheer attention: no moral, no grand statement, just someone kneeling in the grass, naming what's there because it deserves naming. In an age of glancing at nature through screens, that patience feels almost radical.