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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


FOR THE NIGHT TO WEAR by HORTENSE KING FLEXNER

First Line: FOR THE TWILIGHT, THE WET SNOW
Last Line: THE POLAR WIND.
Subject(s): SNOW; WIND; WINTER;

For the twilight, the wet snow,
Heaped on the branch,
The soft white blurring with solids
All angles and edges.
But the dry snow,
Granular,
Sand out of space,
Jewel cut,
Is for the night to wear.
Polished aloft in the metaphysical tides
That swirl between stars,
Its meanings are other
Than the frozen rain of a low cloud.

Orion's belt, hung in the fork
Of the stripped beech
Is kin to this snow,
Restless on eaves and fence-rails,
Fanned like the plume of Everest,
To make visible
The polar wind.



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