Home ⇒ 📌Robert Louis Stevenson ⇒ Winter-Time
Winter-Time
Late lies the wintry sun a-bed,
A frosty, fiery sleepy-head;
Blinks but an hour or two; and then,
A blood-red orange, sets again.
Before the stars have left the skies,
At morning in the dark I rise;
And shivering in my nakedness,
By the cold candle, bathe and dress.
Close by the jolly fire I sit
To warm my frozen bones a bit;
Or with a reindeer-sled, explore
The colder countries round the door.
When to go out, my nurse doth wrap
Me in my comforter and cap;
The cold wind burns my face, and blows
Its frosty pepper up my nose.
Black are my steps on silver sod;
Thick blows my frosty breath abroad;
And tree and house, and hill and lake,
Are frosted like a wedding cake.
(2 votes, average: 3.50 out of 5)
Related poetry:
- A Spell before Winter After the red leaf and the gold have gone, Brought down by the wind, then by hammering rain Bruised and discolored, when October’s flame Goes blue to guttering in the cusp, this land Sinks deeper into silence, darker into shade. There is a knowledge in the look of things, The old hills hunch before the […]...
- Winter When icicles hang by the wall And Dick the shepherd blows his nail And Tom bears logs into the hall, And milk comes frozen home in pail, When Blood is nipped and ways be foul, Then nightly sings the staring owl, Tu-who; Tu-whit, tu-who: a merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. When […]...
- Picture-Books in Winter Summer fading, winter comes Frosty mornings, tingling thumbs, Window robins, winter rooks, And the picture story-books. Water now is turned to stone Nurse and I can walk upon; Still we find the flowing brooks In the picture story-books. All the pretty things put by, Wait upon the children’s eye, Sheep and shepherds, trees and crooks, […]...
- 16-bit Intel 8088 chip with an Apple Macintosh You can’t run Radio Shack programs In its disc drive. Nor can a Commodore 64 Drive read a file You have created on an IBM Personal Computer. Both Kaypro and Osborne computers use The CP/M operating system But can’t read each other’s Handwriting For they format (write On) discs in different […]...
- Spring and Winter ii WHEN icicles hang by the wall, And Dick the shepherd blows his nail, And Tom bears logs into the hall, And milk comes frozen home in pail, When blood is nipp’d, and ways be foul, Then nightly sings the staring owl, To-whit! To-who! a merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. When all […]...
- A Winter Dawn Above the marge of night a star still shines, And on the frosty hills the sombre pines Harbor an eerie wind that crooneth low Over the glimmering wastes of virgin snow. Through the pale arch of orient the morn Comes in a milk-white splendor newly-born, A sword of crimson cuts in twain the gray Banners […]...
- Winter: My Secret I tell my secret? No indeed, not I: Perhaps some day, who knows? But not today; it froze, and blows, and snows, And you’re too curious: fie! You want to hear it? well: Only, my secret’s mine, and I won’t tell. Or, after all, perhaps there’s none: Suppose there is no secret after all, But […]...
- A Winter's Tale Yesterday the fields were only grey with scattered snow, And now the longest grass-leaves hardly emerge; Yet her deep footsteps mark the snow, and go On towards the pines at the hills’ white verge. I cannot see her, since the mist’s white scarf Obscures the dark wood and the dull orange sky; But she’s waiting, […]...
- The Garden in Winter Frosty-white and cold it lies Underneath the fretful skies; Snowflakes flutter where the red Banners of the poppies spread, And the drifts are wide and deep Where the lilies fell asleep. But the sunsets o’er it throw Flame-like splendor, lucent glow, And the moonshine makes it gleam Like a wonderland of dream, And the sharp […]...
- Against Winter The truth is dark under your eyelids. What are you going to do about it? The birds are silent; there’s no one to ask. All day long you’ll squint at the gray sky. When the wind blows you’ll shiver like straw. A meek little lamb you grew your wool Till they came after you with […]...
- To Winter Stay, season of calm love and soulful snows! There is a subtle sweetness in the sun, The ripples on the stream’s breast gaily run, The wind more boisterously by me blows, And each succeeding day now longer grows. The birds a gladder music have begun, The squirrel, full of mischief and of fun, From maples’ […]...
- A Song Of Winter Weather It isn’t the foe that we fear; It isn’t the bullets that whine; It isn’t the business career Of a shell, or the bust of a mine; It isn’t the snipers who seek To nip our young hopes in the bud: No, it isn’t the guns, And it isn’t the Huns It’s the MUD, MUD, […]...
- Lines For Winter Tell yourself As it gets cold and gray falls from the air That you will go on Walking, hearing The same tune no matter where You find yourself Inside the dome of dark Or under the cracking white Of the moon’s gaze in a valley of snow. Tonight as it gets cold Tell yourself What […]...
- Trashcan Lives the wind blows hard tonight And it’s a cold wind And I think about The boys on the row. I hope some of them have a bottle of Red. It’s when you’re on the row That you notice that Everything Is owned And that there are locks on Everything. This is the way a democracy […]...
- Those Winter Sundays Sundays too my father got up early And put his clothes on in the blueback cold, Then with cracked hands that ached From labor in the weekday weather made Banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him. I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking. When the rooms were warm, he’d call, And slowly I […]...
- WINTER BLUES For Penny Abraham I wish I had Auden’s penchant For going about in carpet slippers Or the late HRH Margaret’s panache- A chauffered Rolls with six outriders- This late December day with its sparkle of sun on frost I’d so much rather be in Haworth’s cobbled street With cascades of carols in torchlit procession Or […]...
- Conscious His fingers wake, and flutter up the bed. His eyes come open with a pull of will, Helped by the yellow may-flowers by his head. A blind-cord drawls across the window-sill. . . How smooth the floor of the ward is! what a rug! And who’s that talking, somewhere out of sight? Why are they […]...
- Winter Song Rain and wind, and wind and rain. Will the Summer come again? Rain on houses, on the street, Wetting all the people’s feet, Though they run with might and main. Rain and wind, and wind and rain. Snow and sleet, and sleet and snow. Will the Winter never go? What do beggar children do With […]...
- Autumn And Winter Three months bade wane and wax the wintering moon Between two dates of death, while men were fain Yet of the living light that all too soon Three months bade wane. Cold autumn, wan with wrath of wind and rain, Saw pass a soul sweet as the sovereign tune That death smote silent when he […]...
- Some, too fragile for winter winds Some, too fragile for winter winds The thoughtful grave encloses Tenderly tucking them in from frost Before their feet are cold. Never the treasures in her nest The cautious grave exposes, Building where schoolboy dare not look, And sportsman is not bold. This covert have all the children Early aged, and often cold, Sparrow, unnoticed […]...
- Winter Complaint Now when I have a cold I am careful with my cold, I consult a physician And I do as I am told. I muffle up my torso In woolly woolly garb, And I quaff great flagons Of sodium bicarb. I munch on aspirin, I lunch on water, And I wouldn’t dream of osculating Anybody’s […]...
- Back From Australia Cocooned in Time, at this inhuman height, The packaged food tastes neutrally of clay, We never seem to catch the running day But travel on in everlasting night With all the chic accoutrements of flight: Lotions and essences in neat array And yet another plastic cup and tray. “Thank you so much. Oh no, I’m […]...
- A Day in Bed I wish I had not got a cold, The wind is big and wild, I wish that I was very old, Not just a little child. Somehow the day is very long Just keeping here, alone; I do not like the big wind’s song, He’s growling for a bone He’s like an awful dog we […]...
- Winter Remembered Two evils, monstrous either one apart, Possessed me, and were long and loath at going: A cry of Absence, Absence, in the heart, And in the wood the furious winter blowing. Think not, when fire was bright upon my bricks, And past the tight boards hardly a wind could enter, I glowed like them, the […]...
- Flowers in Winter How strange to greet, this frosty morn, In graceful counterfeit of flower, These children of the meadows, born Of sunshine and of showers! How well the conscious wood retains The pictures of its flower-sown home, The lights and shades, the purple stains, And golden hues of bloom! It was a happy thought to bring To […]...
- The Choice He’d have given me rolling lands, Houses of marble, and billowing farms, Pearls, to trickle between my hands, Smoldering rubies, to circle my arms. You – you’d only a lilting song, Only a melody, happy and high, You were sudden and swift and strong- Never a thought for another had I. He’d have given me […]...
- Christmas Morn Cold frosty mornings Ice on window pain Huddle under coats Keep the warmth in Tiptoe down the stairs All quiet and hushed Barge through the door To see what’s waiting for us. A Christmas tree sparkling, Multi coloured lights, Large shiny baubles, and An angel smiling with delight. Paper chains, garlands Bells, stars and balloons […]...
- Birdcage Walk When the wind blows her veil And uncovers her laughter I cease, I turn pale. When the wind blows her veil From the woes I bewail Of love and hereafter: When the wind blows her veil I cease, I turn pale....
- The Autumn Go, sit upon the lofty hill, And turn your eyes around, Where waving woods and waters wild Do hymn an autumn sound. The summer sun is faint on them The summer flowers depart Sit still as all transform’d to stone, Except your musing heart. How there you sat in summer-time, May yet be in your […]...
- All Is Well Whate’er you dream, with doubt possessed, Keep, keep it snug within your breast, And lay you down and take your rest; And when you wake, to work again, The wind it blows, the vessel goes, And where and whither, no one knows. ‘Twill all be well: no need of care; Though how it will, and […]...
- ARCADIAN WINTER WOE is me to tell it thee, Winter winds in Arcady! Scattered is thy flock and fled From the glades where once it fed, And the snow lies drifted white In the bower of our delight, Where the beech threw gracious shade On the cheek of boy and maid: And the bitter blasts make roar […]...
- Winter Trees All the complicated details Of the attiring and The disattiring are completed! A liquid moon Moves gently among The long branches. Thus having prepared their buds Against a sure winter The wise trees Stand sleeping in the cold....
- Woods in Winter When winter winds are piercing chill, And through the hawthorn blows the gale, With solemn feet I tread the hill, That overbrows the lonely vale. O’er the bare upland, and away Through the long reach of desert woods, The embracing sunbeams chastely play, And gladden these deep solitudes. Where, twisted round the barren oak, The […]...
- Approach Of Winter The half-stripped trees Struck by a wind together, Bending all, The leaves flutter drily And refuse to let go Or driven like hail Stream bitterly out to one side And fall Where the salvias, hard carmine- Like no leaf that ever was – Edge the bare garden....
- Winter Clouded with snow The cold winds blow, And shrill on leafless bough The robin with its burning breast Alone sings now. The rayless sun, Day’s journey done, Sheds its last ebbing light On fields in leagues of beauty spread Unearthly white. Thick draws the dark, And spark by spark, The frost-fires kindle, and soon Over […]...
- My Book Before I drink myself to death, God, let me finish up my Book! At night, I fear, I fight for breath, And wake up whiter than a spook; And crawl off to a bistro near, And drink until my brain is clear. Rare Absinthe! Oh, it gives me strength To write and write; and so […]...
- Butterfly Butterfly, the wind blows sea-ward, strong beyond the garden-wall! Butterfly, why do you settle on my shoe, and sip the dirt on my shoe, Lifting your veined wings, lifting them? big white butterfly! Already it is October, and the wind blows strong to the sea From the hills where snow must have fallen, the wind […]...
- Sonnet 80: O, how I faint when I of you do write O, how I faint when I of you do write, Knowing a better spirit doth use your name, And in the praise thereof spends all his might To make me tongue-tied speaking of your fame. But since your worth, wide as the ocean is, The humble as the proudest sail doth bear, My saucy bark, […]...
- Sonnet LXXX O, how I faint when I of you do write, Knowing a better spirit doth use your name, And in the praise thereof spends all his might, To make me tongue-tied, speaking of your fame! But since your worth, wide as the ocean is, The humble as the proudest sail doth bear, My saucy bark […]...
- An Old Man's Winter Night All out of doors looked darkly in at him Through the thin frost, almost in separate stars, That gathers on the pane in empty rooms. What kept his eyes from giving back the gaze Was the lamp tilted near them in his hand. What kept him from remembering what it was That brought him to […]...