Posts Tagged poetry about winter

Winter Woods (copyright © m.a.h. hinton)

Winter has come to the North Country. Last year by this time we were already buried under snow and had much more still to come. This year there has been just two dustings, but the extended cold stayed away long enough that only the second dusting remains… a few inches of frozen-white that crunches beneath our feet.

Frost is a rural poet and a Northern poet. He is a poet of trees and winter, of the four seasons.

Having lived all my but 5 years of my life in lands of four seasons, I wonder sometimes how Frost plays in those places where snow is a rarity, where seasons are merely approximated. Surely something almost-vital is lost, like when I read Derek Walcott.

On a cold December day, Frost seems like just the thing.

Enjoy!

Looking for a Sunset Bird in Winter
The west was getting out of gold,
The breath of air had died of cold,
When shoeing home across the white,
I thought I saw a bird alight.

In summer when I passed the place
I had to stop and lift my face;
A bird with an angelic gift
Was singing in it sweet and swift.

No bird was singing in it now.
A single leaf was on a bough,
And that was all there was to see
In going twice around the tree.

From my advantage on a hill
I judged that such a crystal chill
Was only adding frost to snow
As gilt to gold that wouldn’t show.

A brush had left a crooked stroke
Of what was either cloud or smoke
From north to south across the blue;
A piercing little star was through.

Listening with a pencil and my ear, these are the lines I marked:

 A brush had left a crooked stroke
Of what was either cloud or smoke
From north to south across the blue;
A piercing little star was through.

In the right hands, rhyme can create great, memorable lines. In the wrong hands, it creates the worst poetry possible… and frequently does. In the hands of Frost… rhyme reached its American zenith. Frost is a rhymer by nature. It was in his bones. He did it so well that no American afterwards will really be able to do it again.

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In this coldest of winters, “Those Winter Sundays” has come often to my mind. That is the way of a good poem… it returns unbidden, yet never unwelcomed.

The key to Hayden’s poem lies in the sound of the consonants. At the beginning of the poem the consonants crack and pop like old houses in the winter night (“blueback,” “cracked,” “ache”) like burning wood. The consonant choices Hayden makes emphasize the meaning and mood of the poem.

In three short stanzas, Hayden takes a simple memory and makes it transcendent and universal: the selflessness of love, the regret of time, the dignity of duty.What makes this a good poem is Hayden’s marriage of tactile language and honest emotion and memory. What makes Hayden a good poet is that he is able to do this over and over.

This is one of Hayden’s better known poems, if indeed you can say that of any Hayden poem. It is certainly one of my favorites… and perfect for this time of year.

Enjoy!

Those Winter Sundays

Sundays too my father got up early
And put his clothes on in the blueback cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he’d call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,

Speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love’s austere and lonely offices?

____

by William Blake

Milton wrote this poem in 1629 at the age of 21. It is often considered his first great poem in English. It is poetically and theologically pure Milton. It is also the best Christmas poem ever written.

For almost 30 years now, I have re-read this poem on Christmas Eve. It is as close to a personal Christmas tradition as I have… one of a few literary/faith disciplines I keep.

These lines in particular are some of my favorite lines anyone has ever written. They are an example of what makes Milton to my mind the greatest poet of the English language.

But peaceful was the night,
Wherein the Prince of Light
His reign of peace upon the earth began:
The winds with wonder whist
Smoothly the waters kist,
Whisp’ring new joys to the mild ocean,
Who now hath quite forgot to rave,
While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.

“On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity” is admittedly a very long poem. At first I thought I would just post a few of my favorite stanza’s here, but I have change my mind. The stanzas can best be appreciated only within the context of the whole poem. And when a poem is this great, it is worth all the time and space you can give to it.

Finally, a note about Blake’s drawing that accompanies this posting. Poet and artist William Blake believed that Milton was the greatest of all poets. He created a number of illustrations for Milton’s work, along with illustrations for his own work. The illustration posted here was done in particular to accompany “On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity.”

I wish to all my readers, a joy-filled Christmas. May we all experience the Incarnation in our lives and in our world.

Merry Christmas.

On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity

I

This is the month, and this the happy morn,
Wherein the Son of Heaven’s eternal King,
Of wedded maid and Virgin Mother born,
Our great redemption from above did bring;
For so the holy sages once did sing,
That he our deadly forfeit should release,
And with his Father work us a perpetual peace.

II

That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable,
And that far-beaming blaze of majesty,
Wherewith he wont at Heaven’s high council-table
To sit the midst of Trinal Unity,
He laid aside, and, here with us to be,
Forsook the Courts of everlasting Day,
And chose with us a darksome house of mortal clay.

III

Say, Heavenly Muse, shall not thy sacred vein
Afford a present to the Infant God?
Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strain,
To welcome him to this his new abode,
Now while the heaven, by the Sun’s team untrod,
Hath took no print of the approaching light,
And all the spangled host keep watch in squadrons bright?

IV

See how from far upon the Eastern road
The star-led Wisards haste with odours sweet!
Oh! run; prevent them with thy humble ode,
And lay it lowly at his blessèd feet;
Have thou the honour first thy Lord to greet,
And join thy voice unto the Angel Quire,
From out his secret altar touched with hallowed fire.

The Hymn

I

It was the winter wild,
While the heaven-born child
All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;
Nature, in awe to him,
Had doffed her gaudy trim,
With her great Master so to sympathize:
It was no season then for her
To wanton with the Sun, her lusty Paramour.

II

Only with speeches fair
She woos the gentle air
To hide her guilty front with innocent snow,
And on her naked shame,
Pollute with sinful blame,
The saintly veil of maiden white to throw;
Confounded, that her Maker’s eyes
Should look so near upon her foul deformities.

III

But he, her fears to cease,
Sent down the meek-eyed Peace:
She, crowned with olive green, came softly sliding
Down through the turning sphere,
His ready Harbinger,
With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing;
And, waving wide her myrtle wand,
She strikes a universal peace through sea and land.

IV

No war, or battail’s sound,
Was heard the world around;
The idle spear and shield were high uphung;
The hookèd chariot stood,
Unstained with hostile blood;
The trumpet spake not to the armèd throng;
And Kings sat still with awful eye,
As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.

V

But peaceful was the night
Wherein the Prince of Light
His reign of peace upon the earth began.
The winds, with wonder whist,
Smoothly the waters kissed,
Whispering new joys to the mild Ocean,
Who now hath quite forgot to rave,
While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.

VI

The stars, with deep amaze,
Stand fixed in steadfast gaze,
Bending one way their precious influence,
And will not take their flight,
For all the morning light,
Or Lucifer that often warned them thence;
But in their glimmering orbs did glow,
Until their Lord himself bespake, and bid them go.

VII

And, though the shady gloom
Had given day her room,
The Sun himself withheld his wonted speed,
And hid his head of shame,
As his inferior flame
The new-enlightened world no more should need:
He saw a greater Sun appear
Than his bright Throne or burning axletree could bear.

VIII

The Shepherds on the lawn,
Or ere the point of dawn,
Sat simply chatting in a rustic row;
Full little thought they than
That the mighty Pan
Was kindly come to live with them below:
Perhaps their loves, or else their sheep,
Was all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep.

IX

When such music sweet
Their hearts and ears did greet
As never was by mortal finger strook,
Divinely-warbled voice
Answering the stringèd noise,
As all their souls in blissful rapture took:
The air, such pleasure loth to lose,
With thousand echoes still prolongs each heavenly close.

X

Nature, that heard such sound
Beneath the hollow round
Of Cynthia’s seat the airy Region thrilling,
Now was almost won
To think her part was done,
And that her reign had here its last fulfilling:
She knew such harmony alone
Could hold all Heaven and Earth in happier union.

XI

At last surrounds their sight
A globe of circular light,
That with long beams the shamefaced Night arrayed;
The helmèd Cherubim
And sworded Seraphim
Are seen in glittering ranks with wings displayed,
Harping in loud and solemn quire,
With unexpressive notes, to Heaven’s newborn Heir.

XII

Such music (as ’tis said)
Before was never made,
But when of old the Sons of Morning sung,
While the Creator great
His constellations set,
And the well-balanced World on hinges hung,
And cast the dark foundations deep,
And bid the weltering waves their oozy channel keep.

XIII

Ring out, ye crystal spheres!
Once bless our human ears,
If ye have power to touch our senses so;
And let your silver chime
Move in melodious time;
And let the bass of heaven’s deep organ blow;
And with your ninefold harmony
Make up full consort of the angelic symphony.

XIV

For, if such holy song
Enwrap our fancy long,
Time will run back and fetch the Age of Gold;
And speckled Vanity
Will sicken soon and die,
And leprous Sin will melt from earthly mould;
And Hell itself will pass away,
And leave her dolorous mansions of the peering day.

XV

Yes, Truth and Justice then
Will down return to men,
The enamelled arras of the rainbow wearing;
And Mercy set between,
Throned in celestial sheen,
With radiant feet the tissued clouds down steering;
And Heaven, as at some festival,
Will open wide the gates of her high palace-hall.

XVI

But wisest Fate says No,
This must not yet be so;
The Babe lies yet in smiling infancy
That on the bitter cross
Must redeem our loss,
So both himself and us to glorify:
Yet first, to those chained in sleep,
The wakeful trump of doom must thunder through the deep,

XVII

With such a horrid clang
As on Mount Sinai rang,
While the red fire and smouldering clouds outbrake:
The aged Earth, aghast
With terror of that blast,
Shall from the surface to the centre shake,
When, at the world’s last sessiön,
The dreadful Judge in middle air shall spread his throne.

XVIII

And then at last our bliss
Full and perfect is,
But now begins; for from this happy day
The Old Dragon under ground,
In straiter limits bound,
Not half so far casts his usurpèd sway,
And, wroth to see his Kingdom fail,
Swindges the scaly horror of his folded tail.

XIX

The Oracles are dumb;
No voice or hideous hum
Runs through the archèd roof in words deceiving.
Apollo from his shrine
Can no more divine,
Will hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving.
No nightly trance, or breathèd spell,
Inspires the pale-eyed Priest from the prophetic cell.

XX

The lonely mountains o’er,
And the resounding shore,
A voice of weeping heard and loud lament;
Edgèd with poplar pale,
From haunted spring, and dale
The parting Genius is with sighing sent;
With flower-inwoven tresses torn
The Nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn.

XXI

In consecrated earth,
And on the holy hearth,
The Lars and Lemures moan with midnight plaint;
In urns, and altars round,
A drear and dying sound
Affrights the Flamens at their service quaint;
And the chill marble seems to sweat,
While each peculiar power forgoes his wonted seat.

XXII

Peor and Baälim
Forsake their temples dim,
With that twice-battered god of Palestine;
And moon&egraved Ashtaroth,
Heaven’s Queen and Mother both,
Now sits not girt with tapers’ holy shine:
The Libyc Hammon shrinks his horn;
In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thammuz mourn.

XXIII

And sullen Moloch, fled,
Hath left in shadows dread
His burning idol all of blackest hue;
In vain with cymbals’ ring
They call the grisly king,
In dismal dance about the furnace blue;
The brutish gods of Nile as fast,
Isis, and Orus, and the dog Anubis, haste.

XXIV

Nor is Osiris seen
In Memphian grove or green,
Trampling the unshowered grass with lowings loud;
Nor can he be at rest
Within his sacred chest;
Nought but profoundest Hell can be his shroud;
In vain, with timbreled anthems dark,
The sable-stolèd Sorcerers bear his worshiped ark.

XXV

He feels from Juda’s land
The dreaded Infant’s hand;
The rays of Bethlehem blind his dusky eyn;
Nor all the gods beside
Longer dare abide,
Not Typhon huge ending in snaky twine:
Our Babe, to show his Godhead true,
Can in his swaddling bands control the damnèd crew.

XXVI

So, when the Sun in bed,
Curtained with cloudy red,
Pillows his chin upon an orient wave,
The flocking shadows pale
Troop to the infernal jail,
Each fettered ghost slips to his several grave,
And the yellow-skirted Fays
Fly after the night-steeds, leaving their moon-loved maze.

XXVII

But see! the Virgin blest
Hath laid her Babe to rest,
Time is our tedious song should here have ending:
Heaven’s youngest-teemèd star
Hath fixed her polished car,
Her sleeping Lord with handmaid lamp attending;
And all about the courtly stable
Bright-harnessed Angels sit in order serviceable.

_____

Robert Hayden

The recent full moon put me in mind of this well known poem by Robert Hayden. That is the way it is with familiar and favorite poems… you will suddenly find yourself repeating lines to yourself while you are doing something else.

That is the kind of poem I have always wanted to write myself. One that someone will suddenly find themselves repeating as they are driving down the street, or out in the yard cutting the grass, or standing in a stream casting for trout.

Detroit-born Hayden studied under Auden. In some of his poems, I fancy that I can see the influence. This is one of those poems. It is something in the interplay between the images and the form, and in some of the word choices. I cannot articulate it any more than that. It is merely a feeling… no doubt originally suggested to me by the fact that when I first read the poem years ago I already knew that he had worked with Auden. But I think is is something more that that.

Two days before Christmas around the time of a full moon, it seems like the perfect poem.

Enjoy!

Full Moon

Robert Frost, that most American of poets, is famous for saying of free verse poetry that it is “like playing tennis without a net.”

As a poet who writes almost exclusively in free verse, I suppose I should take exception. I do not. I understand his point, though I do not accept his analogy. Like many analogies (maybe all) Frost’s poet/tennis comparison is more sleight of hand than pulling aside a veil.

His famous Yankee ear lets him write in a way that traditional and non-traditional rhyme-forms fit best. It is a gift he maximizes as well as any in the 20th Century. Since Frost was a tennis player, a better analogy may have been: writing free verse for Frost would be the same as asking him to play baseball… or basketball… any  sport that he was not so gifted at.

All poets naturally move in a direction that emphasizes their strengths and hides their deficiencies. This is in part what poets mean when they say “finding their voice.” Frost is very aware of his own strengths as a poet… as well as his limitations.

“Dust of Snow” is familiar to anyone who ever took English 101. It is one of those poems that bad English teachers use to display a reading a poem in a way that emphasizes the poetics of hidden meaning,  loaded-language, and literary detective work above all else. For that reason, its true beauty is obscured more often than not for most “well-educated” readers.

“Dust of Snow” is a poem that should be savored above all for its for its language and mood. It is a perfect poem for a November day.

Dust of Snow

The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree
Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued.

_____