Shadows (Howe)/A Winter Elegy

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A WINTER ELEGY
J. F. H.
TO walk beside this winter shore Was not for his young feet;Of summer learned he all his lore,Smiling from life's wide-opened door, A summer world to greet.
This icy channel's narrowed span 'Twas not for him to know;His current, widening as it ran,Still smoothly spreads as it began, Free from our frost and snow.
Like sails of shallops overset, The floes of ice are borne ​Along a tide he knew not yetWhose boat no chilling blasts had met, Where Hope's brave flag is torn.
Now he is gone, I would not find These waters summer-fair,Girt round with meadows bland and kind;The rigors of the winter wind Better befit our care.
Yet sometimes on the snow-wrapped hill A light at evening lies,Tender beyond the summer's skill:—What light, I wonder, fairer still, Gladdens his absent eyes?
And sometimes, touched by winter's breath, I thrill with wakened powers."Youth still is his," a whisper saith;"That searching spirit found not death, But life—more life than ours."
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