Verse and Reverse (1921)/Winter Song

Fast to-night the frost is holding over all the world we know,
Fields we loved are grim and barren underneath the woven snow,
And our forest, palled in purple, seems far less a friend than foe.
But at twilight we foregather by the red and purring flame,
Springtime long ago forsaken, summer but a golden name,
By the hearth, as in the woodland, comradeship remains the same.

Gone the violet of the valley, gone the rose and daffodil,
Song has left our hills of roaming very lonely, very still,
Secret glens have ceased to call us and our river's voice is still.
But our shabby books are with us and our dreams are never o'er,
On the gloom of stark midwinter we will shut our sturdy door,
At our own fireside the love-light burns and beckons ever more.