O Winter! frozen pulse and heart of fire, <br />What loss is theirs who from thy kingdom turn <br />Dismayed, and think thy snow a sculptured urn <br />Of death! Far sooner in midsummer tire <br />The streams than under ice. June could not hire <br />Her roses to forego the strength they learn <br />In sleeping on thy breast. No fires can burn <br />The bridges thou dost lay where men desire <br />In vain to build. <br />O Heart, when Love's sun goes <br />To northward, and the sounds of singing cease, <br />Keep warm by inner fires, and rest in peace. <br />Sleep on content, as sleeps the patient rose. <br />Walk boldly on the white untrodden snows, <br />The winter is the winter's own release.<br /><br />Helen Hunt Jackson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-calendar-of-sonnets-january/
