SNOWBOUND
IT looks so cold, this drifted snow,
So cruelly, deadly cold, and yet
The hidden bulbs and roots below
Deem it their friendliest coverlet.
Wrapped warmly in its fleecy veil
They hear, unshuddering where they lie,
The patter and the hiss of hail,
The angry storm-wind whirling by.
Above, the world is tempest-tossed;
Buried too deep for doubts and fears,
The detonations of the frost
Come dumbed and softened to their ears.
Sleeping, they smile as children do,
Secure of shield and covering,
And trust the Promise, proved and true,
The unforgetting pledge of spring.
Their veins a slumbering pulse informs,
The life within them stirs and grows,
And fed and sheltered so by storms,
They wait content beneath the snows.
Life has its storms; its hard, cold days,
When blasts of grief and frosts of care
Drift in upon the happy ways,
And blight the blooms that made them fair.
Cheerless we scan the wastes of white
Which seem of Hope the high-heaped grave,
Nor guess that hidden far from sight
Lie germs of joy, secure and brave;
And that, when comes God’s blessed spring,
(As surely it shall come at last
To every grieved and patient thing!)
And all the winter-time is past,—
And the snow melts, and hands unseen
Set buds and blossoms on each stem,
We shall note growths which had not been
If Sorrow had not sheltered them!