Winter Again

I love the mystery of life. My vision of the night gives rise to speculation profound. Poetic snowflakes dot the rooftops and the lines “O What fun it is ride” stream from some place nearby to the sensitive ear. And the mind embarks on a serene journey through the Land of Dreams.

Some thoughts flickered through the state of my mind, reminding me of Thoreau’s immortal lines:

“When in the still light of the cheerful moon,
On the every twig and rail and jutting spout,
The icy spears were adding to their length
Against the arrows of the coming sun,
How in the shimmering noon of winter past
Some unrecorded beam slanted across
The upland pastures where the Johnwort grew;”

From behind the fleece-like clouds, when peeks the morning sun, the warmth of winter touches every vein. With idle hands trying to peel the orange and the indolence of waking-up every new morning, Life gets a new colour.

But somewhere the tunes of Christmas

Bear the face of Death’s song;

The sensational poetic lines lose out:

And what lines can make them live

The Joy Of Life?

Tears induced the flow of verse;

But what verse for them if Life is tears?

The hoar that lines the morning grass,

The fog that blinds the vision,

Winter that evokes the poet within,

Shall not understand their dire mission.

It’s bizarre that merciless Winter could serve as an object of Poetry. Or the melodrama of Winter could be so harsh.

Robert Frost’s beautiful lines pose but a very poignant situation in Winter:

“And slept. The log that shifted with a jolt

Once in the stove, disturbed him and he shifted,

And eased his heavy breathing, but still slept.

One aged man — one man — can’t keep a house,

A farm, a countryside, or if he can,

It’s thus he does it of a winter night.”

But the timeless words by Walter De La Mare:

“The rayless sun,

The day’s journey done,

Sheds its last ebbing light

On fields in leagues of beauty spread

Unearthly white.”

Are but the sweetest of all.