At Loschwitz above the city
The air is sunny and chill;
The birch-trees and the pine-trees
Grow thick upon the hill.
Lone and tall, with silver stem,
A birch-tree stands apart;
The passionate wind of spring-time
Stirs in its leafy heart.
I lean against the birch-tree,
My arms around it twine;
It pulses, and leaps, and quivers,
Like a human heart to mine.
One moment I stand, then sudden
Let loose mine arms that cling:
O God! the lonely hillside,
The passionate wind of spring!
Amy Levy (1861 – 1889) was a Victorian era poetess and prose author who wrote in English in the second half of the 19th century, a Jewess, she also wrote on feminist and Jewish themes. She suffered from an acute depression, was likely a lesbian, and is now remembered as a acquaintance of Oscar Wilde. The poetess exterminated herself, that is committed suicide, by inhaling carbon monoxide at her beloved parents’ home. She was the first Jewess to be cremated in England and her ashes are burried in Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery in London.