from Snowbound: A Winter Idyll
John Greenleaf Whittier
To the memory of the household it describes, this poem is dedicated by the author
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The sun that brief December day Rose cheerless over hills of gray, And, darkly circled, gave at noon A sadder light than waning moon. Slow tracing down the thickening sky Its mute and ominous prophecy, A portent seeming less than threat, It sank from sight before it set. A chill no coat, however stout, 10 Of homespun stuff could quite shut out, A hard, dull bitterness of cold, That checked, mid-vein, the circling race Of lifeblood in the sharpened face, The coming of the snowstorm told. The wind blew east; we heard the roar Of Ocean on his wintry shore, And felt the strong pulse throbbing there Beat with low rhythm our inland air. Meanwhile we did our nightly chores,— Brought in the wood from out of doors, Littered° the stalls, and from the mows° Raked down the herd’s-grass for the cows: Heard the horse whinnying for his corn; And, sharply clashing horn on horn, Impatient down the stanchion° rows The cattle shake their walnut bows;° While, peering from his early perch Upon the scaffold’s pole° of birch, The cock his crested helmet bent And down his querulous challenge sent. Unwarmed by any sunset light The gray day darkened into night, A night made hoary° with the swarm And whirl-dance of the blinding storm, As zigzag, wavering to and fro, Crossed and recrossed the wingëd snow: And ere the early bedtime came The white drift piled the window frame, And through the glass the clothesline posts Looked in like tall and sheeted ghosts. So all night long the storm roared on: The morning broke without a sun; In tiny spherule° traced with lines Of Nature’s geometric signs, In starry flake, and pellicle,° All day the hoary meteor fell; And, when the second morning shone, We looked upon a world unknown, On nothing we could call our own. Around the glistening wonder bent The blue walls of the firmament, No cloud above, no earth below,— A universe of sky and snow! The old familiar sights of ours Took marvelous shapes; strange domes and towers Rose up where sty or corncrib stood, Or garden wall, or belt of wood; A smooth white mound the brush pile showed, A fenceless drift what once was road; The bridle post an old man sat With loose-flung coat and high cocked hat; The well curb° had a Chinese roof; And even the long sweep,° high aloof, In its slant splendor, seemed to tell Of Pisa’s leaning miracle.° A prompt, decisive man, no breath Our father wasted: “Boys, a path!” Well pleased, (for when did farmer boy Count such a summons less than joy?) Our buskins° on our feet we drew; With mittened hands, and caps drawn low, To guard our necks and ears from snow, We cut the solid whiteness through. And, where the drift was deepest, made A tunnel walled and overlaid With dazzling crystal: We had read Of rare Aladdin’s° wondrous cave, And to our own his name we gave, With many a wish the luck were ours To test his lamp’s supernal powers. We reached the barn with merry din, And roused the prisoned brutes within. The old horse thrust his long head out, And grave with wonder gazed about; The cock his lusty greeting said, And forth his speckled harem led; The oxen lashed their tails, and hooked, And mild reproach of hunger looked; The hornëd patriarch of the sheep, Like Egypt’s Amun° roused from sleep, Shook his sage head with gesture mute, And emphasized with stamp of foot. All day the gusty north wind bore The loosening drift its breath before; Low circling round its southern zone, The sun through dazzling snow mist shone. No church bell lent its Christian tone To the savage air, no social smoke Curled over woods of snow-hung oak. A solitude made more intense By dreary-voicëd elements, The shrieking of the mindless wind, The moaning tree boughs swaying blind, And on the glass the unmeaning beat Of ghostly fingertips of sleet. Beyond the circle of our hearth No welcome sound of toil or mirth Unbound the spell, and testified Of human life and thought outside. We minded° that the sharpest ear The buried brooklet could not hear, The music of whose liquid lip Had been to us companionship, And, in our lonely life, had grown To have an almost human tone. As night drew on, and, from the crest Of wooded knolls that ridged the west, The sun, a snow-blown traveler, sank From sight beneath the smothering bank, We piled, with care, our nightly stack Of wood against the chimney back,— The oaken log, green, huge, and thick, And on its top the stout backstick; The knotty forestick laid apart, And filled between with curious art The ragged brush; then, hovering near, We watched the first red blaze appear, Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam On whitewashed wall and sagging beam, Until the old, rude-furnished room Burst, flowerlike, into rosy bloom; While radiant with a mimic flame Outside the sparkling drift became, And through the bare-boughed lilac tree Our own warm hearth seemed blazing free. The crane and pendent trammels° showed, The Turks’ heads° on the andirons° glowed; While childish fancy, prompt to tell The meaning of the miracle, Whispered the old rhyme: “Under the tree, When fire outdoors burns merrily, There the witches are making tea.” The moon above the eastern wood Shone at its full; the hill range stood Transfigured in the silver flood, Its blown snows flashing cold and keen, Dead white, save where some sharp ravine Took shadow, or the somber green Of hemlocks turned to pitchy black Against the whiteness at their back. For such a world and such a night Most fitting that unwarming light, Which only seemed where’er it fell To make the coldness visible. Shut in from all the world without, We sat the clean-winged° hearth about, Content to let the north wind roar In baffled rage at pane and door, While the red logs before us beat The frost line back with tropic heat; And ever, when a louder blast Shook beam and rafter as it passed, The merrier up its roaring draft The great throat of the chimney laughed; The house dog on his paws outspread Laid to the fire his drowsy head, The cat’s dark silhouette on the wall A couchant° tiger’s seemed to fall; And, for the winter fireside meet, Between the andirons’ straddling feet, The mug of cider simmered slow, The apples sputtered in a row, And, close at hand, the basket stood With nuts from brown October’s wood. |
Making Meanings
from Snowbound: A Winter Idyll
1. What did you see as you read this part of Snow-Bound?
2. The first eighteen lines of the poem create a mood of foreboding and expectation. List the images that help build this mood.
3. The poet emphasizes the fabulous nature of the snowbound world. What specific imagery helps us see his farmyard as if it’s an exotic sight from another world?
4. Another reference to folklore and the fabulous occurs in the lines describing the crystal cave. In line 80, what do the boys wish they could do? What other details in the poem connect the fabulous or the imaginary with the snowbound farmhouse?
5. A few days spent locked up with family or friends would have some effect on your mood. How do you think you would feel if you were snowbound or otherwise confined with other people? Refer to your Quickwrite notes for ideas.