Shadows (Howe)/A Winter Elegy

​

A WINTER ELEGY
J. F. H.
TO walk beside this winter shore
 Was not for his young feet;
Of summer learned he all his lore,
Smiling from life's wide-opened door,
 A summer world to greet.

This icy channel's narrowed span
 'Twas not for him to know;
His current, widening as it ran,
Still smoothly spreads as it began,
 Free from our frost and snow.

Like sails of shallops overset,
 The floes of ice are borne
 ​Along a tide he knew not yet
Whose boat no chilling blasts had met,
 Where Hope's brave flag is torn.

Now he is gone, I would not find
 These waters summer-fair,
Girt round with meadows bland and kind;
The rigors of the winter wind
 Better befit our care.

Yet sometimes on the snow-wrapped hill
 A light at evening lies,
Tender beyond the summer's skill:—
What light, I wonder, fairer still,
 Gladdens his absent eyes?

And sometimes, touched by winter's breath,
 I thrill with wakened powers.
"Youth still is his," a whisper saith;
"That searching spirit found not death,
 But life—more life than ours."

This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.