London
Snow
by Robert
Bridges
|
| When men were all asleep the snow
came flying, |
| In large white flakes falling on
the city brown, |
| Stealthily and perpetually
settling and loosely lying, |
| Hushing the
latest traffic of the drowsy town; |
| Deadening, muffling, stifling its
murmurs failing; |
| Lazily and incessantly floating
down and down: |
| Silently
sifting and veiling road, roof and railing; |
| Hiding difference, making
unevenness even, |
| Into angles and crevices softly
drifting and sailing. |
| All night it
fell, and when full inches seven |
| It lay in the depth of its
uncompacted lightness, |
| The clouds blew off from a high
and frosty heaven; |
| And all woke
earlier for the unaccustomed brightness |
| Of the winter dawning, the
strange unheavenly glare: |
| The eye marvelled - marvelled at
the dazzling whiteness; |
| The ear
hearkened to the stillness of the solemn air; |
| No sound of wheel rumbling nor of
foot falling, |
| And the busy morning cries came
thin and spare. |
| Then boys I
heard, as they went to school, calling, |
| They gathered up the crystal
manna to freeze |
| Their tongues with tasting, their
hands with snowballing; |
| Or rioted in a
drift, plunging up to the knees; |
| Or peering up from under the white-mossed wonder!' |
| 'O look at the trees!' they
cried, 'O look at the trees!' |
| With lessened
load a few carts creak and blunder, |
| Following along the white
deserted way, |
| A country company long dispersed
asunder: |
| When now
already the sun, in pale display |
| Standing by Paul's high dome,
spread forth below |
| His sparkling beams, and awoke
the stir of the day. |
| For now doors
open, and war is waged with the snow; |
| And trains of sombre men, past
tale of number, |
| Tread long brown paths, as toward
their toil they go: |
| But even for
them awhile no cares encumber |
| Their minds diverted; the daily
word is unspoken, |
| The daily thoughts of labour and
sorrow slumber |
At the sight of the beauty that
greets them, for the charm they have broken.
|
|
Robert Bridges | Classic
Poems |
