The speaker watches cherry and pear trees in full white bloom, their petals falling like snow and shining as if crowned by sunlight. At first the scene feels joyful and bright. Then the wind rises, scattering the petals until the ground is white and the trees are bare. After the wind passes, the speaker looks at the emptied orchards and feels a sharp loss: the brightness that seemed so rich and rare is gone. The poem creates a mood of tenderness turning into sadness. It treats the blossom as something precious and specifically English, but also fragile. The speaker isn’t just describing weather; the final cry mourns the fact that such beauty cannot last. It is an elegy for a moment of spring that has already vanished.
The Crowns — Summary
Cherry and pear are white, Their snows lie sprinkled on the land like light On darkness shed. Far off and near The orchards toss their crowns of delight, And the sun casts down Another shining crown.
The wind tears and throws down Petal by petal the crown Of cherry and pear till the earth is white, And all the brightness is shed In the orchards far off and near, That tossed by the road and under the green hill; And the wind is fled.
Far, far off the wind Has shaken down A brightness that was as the brightness of cherry or pear When the orchards shine in the sun. --Oh there is no more fairness Since this rareness, The radiant blossom of English earth--is dead!