AmyLowell:ToElizabethWardPerkins

Dear Bessie, would my tired rhyme

Had force to rise from apathy,

And shaking off its lethargy

Ring word-tones like a Christmas chime.

But in my souls high belfry, chill

The bitter wind of doubt has blown,

The summer swallows all have flown,

The bells are frost-bound, mute and still.

Upon the crumbling boards the snow

Has drifted deep, the clappers hang

Prismed with icicles, their clang

Unheard since ages long ago.

The rope I pull is stiff and cold,

My straining ears detect no sound

Except a sigh, as round and round

The wind rocks through the timbers old.

Below, I know the church is bright

With haloed tapers, warm with prayer;

But here I only feel the air

Of icy centuries of night.

Beneath my feet the snow is lit

And gemmed with colours, red, and blue,

Topaz, and green, where light falls through

The saints that in the windows sit.

Here darkness seems a spectred thing,

Voiceless and haunting, while the stars

Mock with a light of long dead years

The ache of present suffering.

Silent and winter-killed I stand,

No carol hymns my debt to you;

But take this frozen thought in lieu,

And thaw its music in your hand.