THE JUDAS TREE
WINTER to my tree has lent
Beauty clean and innocent,
Here no purple flowers blow,
But crystal blossoms of the snow,
Every crooked bough is set
With starry petals delicate.
Judas flung the silver down,
And hanged himself beyond the town:
Spring returns. The traitor blood
Quickens in each scarlet bud.
Frost and snow remember not—
Mercy on Iscariot.