Finding holiday inspiration a bit tough to muster, I went on the search for some thematically appropriate public domain poetry. I was delighted to find a ‘new to me’ author named Walter de la Mare. The playfulness of this poem drew me in…

I hope you dig it.

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WINTER by Walter De la Mare

GREEN Mistletoe!
Oh, I remember now
A dell of snow,
Frost on the bough;
None there but I:
Snow, snow, and a wintry sky.

None there but I,
And footprints one by one,
Zigzaggedly,
Where I had run;
Where shrill and powdery
A robin sat in the tree.

And he whistled sweet;
And I in the crusted snow
With snow-clubbed feet
Jigged to and fro,
Till, from the day,
The rose-light ebbed away.

And the robin flew
Into the air, the air,
The white mist through;
And small and rare

The night-frost fell
In the calm and misty dell.

And the dusk gathered low,
And the silver moon and stars
On the frozen snow
Drew taper bars,
Kindled winking fires
In the hooded briers.

And the sprawling Bear
Growled deep in the sky;
And Orion’s hair
Streamed sparkling by:
But the North sighed low,
“Snow, snow, more snow!”

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Collected_poems,_1901-1918/Winter

Recommended by: Speck, Stefan Kartenberg (JeffSpeed68), Apoxode, SackJo22, Wiseman

"Winter (Poem by Walter de la Mare)"
by Kara Square

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