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All day it snows: the sheeted post
Gleams in the dimness like a ghost;
All day the blasted oak has stood
A muffled wizard of the wood;
Garland and airy cap adorn

The sumach and the wayside thorn,

And clustering spangles lodge and shine
In the dark tresses of the pine.

The ragged bramble, dwarfed and old,
Shrinks like a beggar in the cold;
In surplice white the cedar stands,
And blesses him with priestly hands.

Still cheerily the chickadee

Singeth to me on fence and tree:
But in my inmost ear is heard
The music of a holier bird;

And heavenly thoughts, as soft and white
As snow-flakes, on my soul alight,

Clothing with love my lonely heart,
Healing with peace each bruisèd part,
Till all my being seems to be

Transfigured by their purity.

John Townsend Trowbridge [1827-19

A GLEE FOR WINTER

HENCE, rude Winter! crabbed old fellow,
Never merry, never mellow!

Well-a-day! in rain and snow

What will keep one's heart aglow?
Groups of kinsmen, old and young,
Oldest they old friends among;
Groups of friends, so old and true
That they seem our kinsmen too;
These all merry all together
Charm away chill Winter weather.

What will kill this dull old fellow?
Ale that's bright, and wine that's mellow!

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The Death of the Old Year

Dear old songs for ever new;
Some true love, and laughter too;
Pleasant wit, and harmless fun,
And a dance when day is done.
Music, friends so true and tried,
Whispered love by warm fireside,
Mirth at all times all together,

Make sweet May of Winter weather.

1395

Alfred Domett [1811-1887]

THE DEATH OF THE OLD YEAR

FULL knee-deep lies the winter snow,
And the winter winds are wearily sighing:
Toll ye the church-bell sad and slow,
And tread softly and speak low,
For the old year lies a-dying.
Old year, you must not die;
You came to us so readily,
You lived with us so steadily,
Old year, you shall not die.

He lieth still, he doth not move;
He will not see the dawn of day.

He hath no other life above,

He gave me a friend, and a true true-love,
And the New-year will take 'em away.

Old year, you must not go;

So long as you have been with us,
Such joy as you have seen with us,
Old year, you shall not go.

He frothed his bumpers to the brim;
A jollier year we shall not see.
But though his eyes are waxing dim,
And though his foes speak ill of him,
He was a friend to me.

Old year, you shall not die;

We did so laugh and cry with you,
I've half a mind to die with you,
Old year, if you must die.

He was full of joke and jest,
But all his merry quips are o'er.

To see him die, across the waste
His son and heir doth ride post-haste,
But he'll be dead before.

Every one for his own.

The night is starry and cold, my friend,

And the New-year, blithe and bold, my friend, Comes up to take his own.

How hard he breathes! over the snow

I heard just now the crowing cock.
The shadows flicker to and fro:

The cricket chirps; the light burns low;
'Tis nearly twelve o'clock.

Shake hands before you die.

Old year, we'll dearly rue for you.
What is it we can do for you?
Speak out before you die.

His face is growing sharp and thin.
Alack! our friend is gone.

Close up his eyes; tie up his chin;

Step from the corpse, and let him in
That standeth there alone,

And waiteth at the door.

There's a new foot on the floor, my friend,

And a new face at the door, my friend,

A new face at the door.

Alfred Tennyson [1809-1892]

DIRGE FOR THE YEAR

ORPHAN hours, the year is dead,
Come and sigh, come and weep!

Merry hours, smile instead,

For the year is but asleep.
See it smiles as it is sleeping,
Mocking your untimely weeping.

Dirge for the Year

As an earthquake rocks a corse

In its coffin in the clay,

So white Winter, that rough nurse,
Rocks the dead-cold year to-day;
Solemn hours! wail aloud

For your mother in her shroud.

As the wild air stirs and sways
The tree-swung cradle of a child,
So the breath of these rude days
Rocks the year:-be calm and mild,
Trembling hours; she will arise
With new love within her eyes.

January gray is here,

Like a sexton by her grave;

February bears the bier;

March with grief doth howl and rave,

And April weeps-but, O, ye hours,
Follow with May's fairest flowers.

1397

Percy Bysshe Shelley [1792-1822]

WOOD AND FIELD AND RUNNING

BROOK

WALDEINSAMKEIT

I Do not count the hours I spend

In wandering by the sea;
The forest is my loyal friend,

Like God it useth me.

In plains that room for shadows make
Of skirting hills to lie,

Bound in by streams which give and take
Their colors from the sky;

Or on the mountain-crest sublime,
Or down the oaken glade,

O what have I to do with time?
For this the day was made.

Cities of mortals woe-begone
Fantastic care derides,

But in the serious landscape lone

Stern benefit abides.

Sheen will tarnish, honey cloy,

And merry is only a mask of sad,
But, sober on a fund of joy,

The woods at heart are glad.

There the great Planter plants.

Of fruitful worlds the grain,
And with a million spells enchants
The souls that walk in pain.

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