Winter

I sat and the woman joined me
On the wintry steel settee.
Soon we rose silently to the window
And leaned out on the cold window sill.
Every wall was damp depraved and dead;
Damp depraved and dead they were!
It’s hibernation time for man;
Time and again there was a madrigal
From the youth quaffing at the bar;
The ageing drunks sprawling as they pass.
But for this prevailed the great silence-
The conditioner of creation and hope.
Oh! The nest hanging from the naked tree!
Are they pining for a phoenix?

I glanced aside at the woman,
And hastened to the wintry steel settee.
I’m not gossiping with the woman;
I fear the trimming of my hair;
I never tried the riddles of life,
Nor did I claim to be a mystic,
Holding the key to the gates of heaven;
I was not a prophet of any degree;
But I will say what I will,
Even as you deem me a Cassandra:
Man was happy when he was not hopeless;
Birds were brisk before they were pinioned;
Trees were green and full of leaves,
Before the leaves fell and were no more.
They are all dead and beyond retrieval.
What now of our charade,
With hope as the key-word,
And summer at the guessing end?