Like seaweed under water, The uneventful trees Move at my window In the mist of the morning.
If I could count the leaves And multiply them by The number of seasons left me, And were every leaf a love, There would still not be enough To have before I die.
Ah, what stubborn stuff I waken to find In the cells of the mind On the sills of the morning.
A man looks out his window at dawn and sees trees swaying in the mist, as slow and ordinary as seaweed drifting underwater. Nothing is happening, and that quiet is where the poem begins. Then his thoughts turn to arithmetic: take every leaf on those trees, multiply by the seasons he has left, and imagine each leaf as a love. Even then, he says, it wouldn't be enough. The wish is enormous, and the speaker knows it can't be met. What he wants from life is more than any lifetime can hold.
The last stanza shifts from the trees to the speaker himself. Waking brings back something "stubborn" in the mind, a hunger or restlessness that won't settle. The mood is wistful and a little rueful rather than despairing. The speaker sounds more amazed than angry at how greedy the heart stays, even in a calm, gray morning.