A winter sky is overcast and gray ... The shocks of corn like buckskin tepees rise Beyond the dreary pasture's eastern side ... The verdured slopes have turned to darkest tan, And through the chilly day a flock of sheep Is nibbling at the scanty forage found ... The silly geese outspread their gleaming wings, And screaming, run as though by demons chased -- Fat colts prance round and round to race their blood; The stolid cattle crop the withered grass Where linger traces of a fall of snow ... The sheep and colts and cattle graze and graze -- The awkward geese are ever on a quest ... These happy creatures do not, cannot know That in a chamber in the slate-hued house The hands that toiled to feed them carefully At morn and eve in winter's bitterness, Are lying folded, calm and pulseless now, And free eternally from toil and care. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...STREET WINDOW by CARL SANDBURG A COMPARISON [ADDRESSED] TO A YOUNG LADY by WILLIAM COWPER TALES OF A WAYSIDE INN: THE SECOND DAY: LADY WENTWORTH by HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW ON A YOUNG BRIDE DROWNED IN THE BOSPHORUS by AGATHIAS SCHOLASTICUS ON THE DEATH OF THE PRINCESS CHARLOTTE by ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD THE BLACK MOUSQUETAIRE; A LEGEND OF FRANCE by RICHARD HARRIS BARHAM |