The Pale Forest

The trees move slowly back and forth
To the sound of a melody,
Pale as winter stars in the North,
Pale as a childhood memory.
They are clad in snow-white flowers,
Shading snow-white, snow-pale bowers.

Between the veils like buds of May,
Go nodding heads of Queen Anne's lace,
Nodding lilies upon the way,
Carved from diamond wonder and grace.
Starflowers and moonflowers pale
Grow beyond the apple-bloom veil.

Spiderwebs gleam like pure spindrift,
Encircling trunks in crystal strands,
A dew-dusted, fairy-wing gift,
Offered from still more pale lands.
Ponds and small brooks shimmer and gleam,
Lost in remnants of a dawn-dream.

In the heart of the pale forest,
There lies a pond with lilies fair
Singing on water a chorus 
That makes water more white than air.
There swans swim in white perfection,
Causing glory with reflection.

And there, the pale forest's pale crown-
There, where the swans swim in their dreams-
There, where the white flowers drift down-
There, the most radiant face gleams:
Caught in the pool as pale as morn
Is the face of a unicorn.