A SNOWY MORN by MARY D. WALLACE

The storm king came to earth last night,
This morn the world's a fairy sight.
The roofs of houses take strange shapes,
They're frosted just like wedding cakes,
And every twig and bush and tree
Is outlined in white tracery.

Across the roadway down below
Our minister is shoveling snow.
The soft light stuff is just as white
As gospel truth he preached last night.
With desperate haste he clears away
For feet that might be led astray,
Straight to the church, a broad white track;
No turning there, nor looking back.
He wields the shovel like the Word
With earnestness, and not deterred
By anything. His coat is black
As sin. It's boundless white
That makes that spot stand out so bright.

The doctor's lawn, next to the manse,
Is buried 'neath the white expanse.
Its master fusses here and there
With anxious eye and busy care
As if he shoveled up in pills
An antidote for human ills.
Though carefully he cleans the walk,
At the least chance he stops to talk,
And sends across a grouch barrage
Which we all know is camouflage.
"He doesn't like this kind of work!
The minister is sure a shirk
Who hasn't shoveled to the line!"
Ah, we are thinking all the time
Of who it was that just last year
To that same minister brought cheer,
Spaded his garden, cut the grass,
Nor let one deed of kindness pass
Within a neighbor's thought or care
When sickness lay so heavy there.
A heart more soft I do not know,
He never turns deaf ear to woe;
With sympathy he mixes pills
To ease both mind and body ills.

The minister, his task all done,
Shoulders his shovel like a gun,
In boyish fun turns toward his friend
With kind intent a hand to lend.
His cheery voice rings on the air,
"Need any help now over there?"

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