NOW Winter as a shrivelled scroll Casts the rags of Summer away, Naked and beautiful the stripped soul Haunts the bare woods, austere and grey. Clean in the quiet hour she goes She has renounced the lure of sense, More beautiful than the gold and rose In her thin veil of innocence. White as the snow she walks the woods, More beautiful than the joyous Spring: Scourged of the winds and washed by floods, Spirit and flame, with a drooped wing. There is not a stain in this pale light, The new-washed skies, the tonic air, She, the moon's sister, walks the height, A spiritual beauty past compare. When all the Summer world is dust And Autumn glories fallen to clay, This soul of beauty, chill, august, Wanders by wood and waterway. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE LAST RESERVATION by WALTER LEARNED AFAR IN THE DESERT by THOMAS PRINGLE ODE TO THE WEST WIND by PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY THE LOVER TO THE THAMES OF LONDON TO FAVOUR HIS LADY ... by GEORGE TURBERVILLE THE TEMPTATION OF OUR LORD: BALEUS PROLOCUTOR by JOHN BALE |