IN a gray, a gray-green wood, Where the trees were gray, the mist green, Spring slept under the hood Of Winter, Winter bony and lean, Whose skeleton in the loud, long-breathing wind Rocked, and was ever creaking. In the gray-green wood A voice was speaking. In her sleep, in her dreaming sleep, Spring was speaking. Her voice was it crept from the deep Of the hooded grave? Was it the bones of Winter creaking, The fox stirring, the owl's voice that from distance Did with a mourner's footstep creep? —No, Spring was speaking. In a burning, a slow burning wood, Life sank, dying, dying. Fire burned sullen, lingering, Emaciate light stumbled under the flood Of the vast Nubian's hair; But still awhile were uplifted Her sallow arms in the west hemisphere, Her voice was crying. In a black, a smokeless wood, Night spread her sheenless hair. Winter gaunt, unattended, unhonoured stood And stamped on a stony grave. —@3Beware, beware, beware!@1 The owl shrieked, but still Winter hoofed the sod, And still the owl shrieked. Then, at her long crying, He trembled, and shrank sighing. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...REPORT ON EXPERIENCE by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN OLNEY HYMNS: 18. LOVEST THOU ME? by WILLIAM COWPER AN INTERNATIONAL EPISODE (1889) by CAROLINE KING DUER THE BLINDED BIRD by THOMAS HARDY SONNET ON SITTING DOWN TO READ KING LEAR ONCE AGAIN by JOHN KEATS SONGO RIVER; CONNECTING LAKE SEBAGO AND LONG LAKE by HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW |