 | The select poems of Dr. Thomas Dunn English (exclusive of the "Battle lyrics") |  |
275
SNOW.
Now thicker and quicker the flakes appear
In the grey of the speckled atmosphere;
Hither and thither they heave and toss
Till the roofs grow white with the wintry moss;
Froward and toward the wild snow shifts
In whirls and eddies, in sheets and drifts—
Whatever it touches it blanches;
It forms new shapes at the breeze's whim;
Alights and crawls on the oak-tree's limb;
Covers the dead, unsightly leaves;
Builds its nest at my cottage eaves;
Swings from the top of the gloomy pine;
Feathers the tendrils and twigs of the vine;
And creeps through the red cedar's branches.
In the grey of the speckled atmosphere;
Hither and thither they heave and toss
Till the roofs grow white with the wintry moss;
Froward and toward the wild snow shifts
In whirls and eddies, in sheets and drifts—
Whatever it touches it blanches;
It forms new shapes at the breeze's whim;
Alights and crawls on the oak-tree's limb;
Covers the dead, unsightly leaves;
Builds its nest at my cottage eaves;
Swings from the top of the gloomy pine;
Feathers the tendrils and twigs of the vine;
And creeps through the red cedar's branches.
Sweeps to the westward the tempest away;
The deep-blue above us has conquered the grey;
Yet warmth is asleep in the rays of the sun;
Light lies the snow though its falling be done;
Crouch in their mantle the evergreen leaves;
No water-drops drip from the snow-burdened eaves
On the twigs of the leafless clematis;
Before me I see the cold regions that lie
Where the northern aurora shoots up on the sky
Where over the snow, in their light sledges go
The broad-visaged Lapp and the dwarf Eskemo;
And thus may I gaze at the scintillant rays
That in boreal regions bewilder and blaze,
And yet never stir from my lattice.
The deep-blue above us has conquered the grey;
Yet warmth is asleep in the rays of the sun;
Light lies the snow though its falling be done;
Crouch in their mantle the evergreen leaves;
No water-drops drip from the snow-burdened eaves
On the twigs of the leafless clematis;
Before me I see the cold regions that lie
Where the northern aurora shoots up on the sky
Where over the snow, in their light sledges go
The broad-visaged Lapp and the dwarf Eskemo;
And thus may I gaze at the scintillant rays
That in boreal regions bewilder and blaze,
And yet never stir from my lattice.
276
What to me now are the wonderful homes
That are carved in the caverns of earth by the gnomes?
What if I never the palace have seen
Which the slaves of the Lamp raised for young Alla Deen?
Here I behold in the splendor of noon,
What no teller of tales to the Caliph Haroun,
Ever dreamed in his wildest of fancies;
Rubies and topazes break into blaze;
Opals are throwing out rainbows in rays;
Diamonds, emeralds, sapphires their light
Dart like the sheen of a sabre in fight;
Column and architrave, cornice and freize
Rise on the fences and spring from the trees;
The elves have come out of romances.
That are carved in the caverns of earth by the gnomes?
What if I never the palace have seen
Which the slaves of the Lamp raised for young Alla Deen?
Here I behold in the splendor of noon,
What no teller of tales to the Caliph Haroun,
Ever dreamed in his wildest of fancies;
Rubies and topazes break into blaze;
Opals are throwing out rainbows in rays;
Diamonds, emeralds, sapphires their light
Dart like the sheen of a sabre in fight;
Column and architrave, cornice and freize
Rise on the fences and spring from the trees;
The elves have come out of romances.
Bright is the scene as the dream of a child
Which you read when he started in slumber and smiled;
Calm as the lives of our Parents, ere sin
To the Garden of Eden, a serpent, crept in;
Pure as the love that the mother possest,
When first her first-born to her bosom she prest;
And glowing as fondness in woman;
At the wide waste before me of crystalline white,
I gaze from the lattice in joy and delight,
And believe, though the sage at the fancy may frown,
When the flakes from their home in the sky flutter down,
So chaste in their nature, so pure in their glow,
That the tears of the angels are frozen to snow,
As they weep for the sins that are human.
Which you read when he started in slumber and smiled;
Calm as the lives of our Parents, ere sin
To the Garden of Eden, a serpent, crept in;
Pure as the love that the mother possest,
When first her first-born to her bosom she prest;
And glowing as fondness in woman;
At the wide waste before me of crystalline white,
I gaze from the lattice in joy and delight,
And believe, though the sage at the fancy may frown,
When the flakes from their home in the sky flutter down,
So chaste in their nature, so pure in their glow,
That the tears of the angels are frozen to snow,
As they weep for the sins that are human.
| The select poems of Dr. Thomas Dunn English (exclusive of the "Battle lyrics") | |