More Snow!
Looks like this winter is going to be one storm a week. But actually, if it’s only 2 or 3 inches at a time, I can deal with it. It’s the huge dumps of snow - 20 inches at a time - that are the killers!
This morning I walked to the bus stop rather than take the train, ferry, and subway to work. It was gorgeous. I left about 10 to 7 and the sun wasn’t yet up so the sky was still blue-ish and the snow was falling - big fat flakes. Really lovely. And the fact I was the first footsteps in some of the snow was a kick. As I was walking along I remembered part of a poem from freshman year (high school) english class:
The snow had begun in the gloaming / and busily all the night / had been heaping field and highway / with a silence deep and white.
So of course I start thinking about english class and that brought to mind another poem:
I must go down to the seas again / to the lonely sea and the sky / and all I ask is a tall ship / and a star to steer her by.
And then finally, I thought of John Donne’s
No man is an island, entire of himself. Every man is a piece of the promontory a part of the main. … Any man’s death diminishes me, therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee.
So of course I had to google these poems once I got on the bus. So here for your pleasure are The First Snow Fall by James Russell Lowell, I Must Go Down to the Sea by John Masefield, and last (but certainly not least) Meditation XVII by John Donne.
The First Snow-Fall
By James Russell Lowell
THE SNOW had begun in the gloaming,
And busily all the night
Had been heaping field and highway
With a silence deep and white.
Every pine and fir and hemlock
Wore ermine too dear for an earl,
And the poorest twig on the elm-tree
Was ridged inch deep with pearl.
From sheds new-roofed with Carrara
Came Chanticleer’s muffled crow,
The stiff rails softened to swan’s-down,
And still fluttered down the snow.
I stood and watched by the window
The noiseless work of the sky,
And the sudden flurries of snow-birds,
Like brown leaves whirling by.
I thought of a mound in sweet Auburn
Where a little headstone stood;
How the flakes were folding it gently,
As did robins the babes in the wood.
Up spoke our own little Mabel,
Saying, “Father, who makes it snow?”
And I told of the good All-father
Who cares for us here below.
Again I looked at the snow-fall,
And thought of the leaden sky
That arched o’er our first great sorrow,
When that mound was heaped so high.
I remembered the gradual patience
That fell from that cloud like snow,
Flake by flake, healing and hiding
The scar that renewed our woe.
And again to the child I whispered,
“The snow that husheth all,
Darling, the merciful Father
Alone can make it fall!”
Then, with eyes that saw not, I kissed her;
And she, kissing back, could not know
That my kiss was given to her sister,
Folded close under deepening snow.
I Must Go Down to the Sea
John Masefield
I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face and a grey dawn breaking.
I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.
I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.
MEDITATION XVII
Devotions upon Emergent Occasions
John Donne
No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as well as if a Manor of thy friends or of thine owne were; any mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.
