When late at night the owlet hoots, And hoots, and hoots; And wild winds make of keyholes flutes: When to the door the goodman’s boots Stamp through the snow the light strains red, The firelight’s red; There is nothing to do, and all is said, And you quaff your cider and go to bed And dream of the summer, dearie.
When, nearing dawn, the black cock crows, And crows, and crows; And from the barn the milch-cow lows: And the milkmaid’s cheeks have each a rose, And the still skies show a star or two, Or one or two; There is little to say, and much to do, And the heartier done the happier you, With a song of the winter, dearie.
How does the Autumn in her mind conclude The tragic masque her frosty pencil writes, Broad on the pages of the days and nights, In burning lines of orchard, wold, and wood? What lonelier forms--that at the year’s door stood At spectral wait--with wildly wasted lights Shall enter? and with melancholy rites Inaugurate their sadder sisterhood?-- Sorrow, who lifts a signal hand, and slow The green leaf fevers, falling ere it dies; Regret, whose pale lips summon: and gaunt Woe Wakes the wild wind-harps with sonorous sighs; And Sleep, who sits with poppied eyes and sees The earth and sky grow dream-accessories.
The frail eidolons of all blossoms Spring, Year after year, about the forest tossed, The magic touch of the enchanter, Frost, Back from the Heaven of the Flow’rs doth bring; Each branch and bush in silence visiting With phantom beauty of its blooms long lost: Each dead weed bends, white-haunted of its ghost, Each dead flower stands ghostly with blossoming. This is the wonder-legend Nature tells To the gray moon and mist a winter’s night; The fairy-tale which from her fancy wells With all the glamour of her soul’s delight: Before the summoning sorcery of her eyes Rising, as might a dream materialize.
A mist that froze beneath the moon and shook Minutest frosty crystals in the air. All night the wind was still as lonely Care Who sighs before her shivering inglenook. The face of Winter wore a cruder look Than when he shakes the icicles from his hair, And, in the boisterous pauses, lets his stare Freeze through the forest, fettering bough and brook. He is the despot now who sits and dreams Of desolation and despair, and smiles At poverty, who hath no place to rest, Who wanders o’er Life’s snow-made-pathless miles, And sees the Home-of-Comfort’s window gleams, Hugging her rag-wrapped baby to her breast.