A couple sits quietly in a rocky mountain hollow among cranberries, aware that the bees, squirrels, and peaks around them seem free of guilt and self-consciousness. They call themselves sinners, but it feels almost playful—they are the only ones carrying memory and human awareness into this dreamy afternoon. The mountains remain above them, beautiful and remote, not casting any shadow of judgment. Then the speaker turns tenderly to the companion: the close cranberries, the wrestling dragonflies, and the lover’s head resting against him feel like their own private love-song. Still, the ending sighs with loneliness. Being part of the crowded human world seems to make them feel more isolated; the speaker wishes the two could exist without that swarm, held only in the landscape’s quiet dream.
Sinners — Summary
The big mountains sit still in the afternoon light Shadows in their lap; The bees roll round in the wild-thyme with delight.
We sitting here among the cranberries So still in the gap Of rock, distilling our memories
Are sinners! Strange! The bee that blunders Against me goes off with a laugh. A squirrel cocks his head on the fence, and wonders
What about sin?--For, it seems The mountains have No shadow of us on their snowy forehead of dreams
As they ought to have. They rise above us Dreaming For ever. One even might think that they love us.
Little red cranberries cheek to cheek, Two great dragon-flies wrestling; You, with your forehead nestling Against me, and bright peak shining to peak--
There's a love-song for you!--Ah, if only There were no teeming Swarms of mankind in the world, and we were less lonely!