Cold—piercing cold!
And Time's life current, so free and bold,
Congeals in his veins as the year grows old.
Keen and clear the Aurora gleams
On skeleton forests and coffined streams:
Night dews freezing as they fall
On the stiff stark earth in her wide white pall;
Ghostly cloud-wreaths hurrying past,
Shivering down the icy blast;
A silver world set in an iron sky,
And a steel-bright moon for company.