The Winter Scene (I-II) / Bliss Carman

The Winter Scene

I

The rutted roads are all like iron; skies
Are keen and brilliant; only the oak-leaves cling
In the bare woods, or the hardy bitter-sweet;
Drivers have put their sheepskin jackets on;
And all the ponds are sealed with sheeted ice
That rings with stroke of skate and hockey-stick,
Or in the twilight cracks with running whoop.
Bring in the logs of oak and hickory,
And make an ample blaze on the wide hearth.
Now is the time, with winter o'er the world,
For books and friends and yellow candle-light,
And timeless lingering by the settling fire.
While all the shuddering stars are keen with cold.

"Winter Scenes Prelude & I: Shuddering Stars," composed by Donald Skirvin

II

Out from the silent portal of the hours,

When frosts are come and all the hosts put on.

Their burnished gear to march across the night

And o'er a darkened earth in splendor shine,

Slowly above the world Orion wheels

His glittering square, while on the shadowy hill

And throbbing like a sea-light through the dusk,

Great Sirius rises in his flashing blue.

Lord of the winter night, august and pure,

Returning year on year untouched by time,

To hearten faith with thine unfaltering fire,

There are no hurts that beauty cannot ease,

No ills that love cannot at last repair,

In the victorious progress of the soul.

~~

Bliss Carman (1861-1929)

from Sanctuary: Sunshine House sonnets, 1929

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada and the European Union]

Bliss Carman biography

"Winter Scenes II: Unfaltering Fire," composed by Donald Skirvin