SPRING | BEHOLDING | BRIGHTENING AIR
Yearning for Apple Blossoms
“Who called me by my name and ran…”
It’s the time of Spring when the apple blossoms are bursting out, and that means that we get to enjoy the apple trees in our yard, and make a pilgrimage to see two of our favorite apple trees in Southeast Connecticut.
To the Hazel Wood
I’ve really wanted to look at them this year because I discovered a poem by William Yeats, The Song of Wandering Aengus. It is a mystical poem, one about fire in the head, salmon turning to glimmering girls, and lifelong yearnings for deeply spiritual experiences.
I wish I could claim that I knew it because I know Yeats, but I’m afraid not. I need to read more Yeats. The more I read him, the more I feel fed. But alas, I discovered this poem only because I was touched by a song of the same name by Noriana Kennedy from the Irish band Solas. It brought me to tears, and I wanted to know the lyrics. You can listen here:
Beautifully played… poignantly sung. And here’s the poem….
The Song of Wandering Aengus¹
I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.
When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire a-flame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And someone called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossom in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air.
Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands;
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done,
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.
Yearnings…
It’s so strange and compelling to me. “And when white moths were on the wing, And moth-like stars were flickering out…” “And pluck till time and times are done, The silver apples of the moon, The golden apples of the sun.” Just lovely.
It’s the lifelong compulsion of poor Aengus to find that glimmering girl that wells up the tears for me. Aengus is not sad or hopeless with looking—quite the opposite. “I will find out where she has gone,” he says. It’s a foregone conclusion, although he has grown old with wanderings “through hollow lands and hilly lands.”
I entered into the story of a man the other day who had a very difficult life, and who also had a profoundly spiritual experience as a child. On the strength of that mystical occurrence, he built a life that transcended his hardship. And now, lying in the hospital, I feel his yearning… his deep desire to know just what it was that “called me by my name and ran, and faded through the brightening air.” His story reminded me of Wandering Aengus.
And so too, I yearn, like there’s a fire in my head, and like I’m blowing a fire aflame. I can’t even say what I am searching for, but somehow I know I will find it, growing old in the looking, and walk among long dappled grass. It touches my heart to think about it… and I can’t quite say why. Both the poem and the song push gently on that heartbreak, though.
We behold our favorite apple trees…
The first is an ancient tree at Haley Farm State Park in Groton, CT. This apple tree was old when this was a working farm, early in the last century, and it is beautiful in full bloom.
The second apple tree stands along the shores of Long Island Sound at Harkness Memorial State Park in Waterford, CT. Because the micro-climate is a little different here, this one is not quite in bloom, but the reds and pinks of the very pregnant flower buds are stunning.
We’ve written about this tree before:
Beholding. Now, that’s the word for what we’re doing. We stand under these trees, mouths wide open, arms spread, and we’re “being-held” by them and their beauty. Beholding is what you do when you find an object of beauty… when you encounter the spiritual moment… when you find that glimmering girl with apple blossom in her hair…
¹ Poetry Foundation. (n.d.). The song of Wandering Aengus. Poetry Foundation. Accessed on 5/3/2025. Taken from William Yeats book The Wind Among the Reeds (1899)
writes about paying attention to small things… spot on!
The Rev. Ron Steed is an Episcopal Deacon in Southeast Connecticut and a chaplain at Lawrence & Memorial Hospital in New London, CT. He writes haiku and lyrical prose that he hopes will help others put the head and heart in right-relation.
Top writer in Art, Watercolor, Haiku, Sermons, and Episcopal Church.
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