Liquidambar styraciflua, top, beltsville, md

Nothing is so beautiful as Spring--When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;Thrush's eggs look like little low heavens, and thrushThrough the echoing timber does so rinse and wringThe ear, it strikes like lightning to hear him sing;The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brushThe descending blue; that blue is all in a rushWith richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling. - Gerard Manley Hopkins