A Memory of Winter

All day, in flakes of saintly white,The snow fell down;Wrapping in ermine folds the heightAbove the town;Hanging each patient hemlock-treeWith bridal veils;Changing the forest to a seaFlecked with white sails.

Over each savage, black-browed rock,Climb crystal flowers,—Wild lily-cup, and holly-hock,From winter's bowers;And on the hillside, by the spring,Rise pillared fanes,Gorgeous enough for reigning kingAnd all his thanes.

A silence steals upon the earth;The snow-mists flee;The winds wake unto stronger birthTheir minstrelsy;Their organ bass on high they shriekThrough the cold sky,Rending the dismal silence bleakWith their wild cry.

Forth from their prisons peep the stars,Like frightened girlsWhen battle-smoke round brave hussarsIts red fog curls;And wildly on the sky's broad plainThe cloud-forms reel,Like men when cannon's deadly rainBreaks coats of steel.

Eastward the troop of gloom-black cloudsTake up their march;Seeming like dismal funeral shroudsOn heaven's arch;Building above the shuddering worldA cenotaph,Writing on scroll of blue unfurledGod's autograph.

Cold, cold the icy wind comes downFrom Northern moors,Frightening the stray birds feathered brown,—Hark! how it roars!Tumbling the restless, feathery snowTo swelling hills;Filling the air with frosty glowAnd frozen chills.

The moonlight silent as the dead,And ghostly white,Sinks down through weird and frosty void,Down, in the night,Dropping upon the river's breastA mail of pearl,On each still wave a diamond crestFit for an earl.

The mountain cliffs crash wide apart,With deafening sound;And up the answering echoes startFrom all around;The fierce winds with their bellowings strive,Making high boasts,Until the whole earth seems aliveWith noisy ghosts.

The regal Night tramps grandly on,The still stars flame;And high in heaven the cold, calm moonShines on, the same;Pallid and white the great earth lies,—A conquered thing,—Submissive to the stern decreesOf Winter-King.