The Last Of Winter

I The Last of Winter
2081

Oh, not for us the primrose faint, the south wind’s hush-a-low
Down shining aisles of the beech-trees that know us years ago!
Here there’s a long, long allence and the dumbly falling snow

The prairie polls away, away, the Mils are covered deep
The water springs in the coulees are sleeping a frozen sleep
The sun-dogs glimmer for a storm;
how long shall winter keep?

Among the hungry cattle ’tis weary work to ride
And see the weak-kneed mothers go stumbling side by side,
Muzzling under the crusted snow for where new grass may hide

There’s not a blade of green yet, the last year’s growth is renk,
Sodden and brown beneath the snow en hill and bottom and bank
Every horse is a brute this month, and every man is a crank

Only the evening hours are good, when two can sit apart
Within the light of the fire they lit cursing the winter’s smart;
The hand is warm in another hand, the heart is safe with a heart

II The First of Spring
There was a sound of whistling wings over the house last night,
And the wild duck dropped in the creek below, resting upon his flight;
Now the mallard with his emerald neck is swimming round in the light

A warm wind from the mountains came pouring like a tide
The strong Chinook has broken the heart of winter’s icy pride,
And the snow has all gone up like smoke from a prairie sunny and wide

Here are gray buds of the crocus, but shut and slivery dim,
Along the creek there are mouse-ears on the willows red and slim;
A blue tit feeds there upside down in the manner approved by him

Hill snows melt and rush in streams bubbling and dark as wine:
Cattle are drifting out of the hills- well do we know that sign!
And soft clouds blowing across the blue have a beauty half divine

New grass and sweet will soon be here, and the patient herd grow strong,
They will forget the cruel frost and all the winter’s wrong:
None can be glad as we are glad un- less they have waited long
-Moira O’Neill, McClure’s