Fugitive Poetry. 1600–1878/Lines written in a Severe Frost

Lines Written in a Severe Frost and Strong Haze, on Sunday Morning.

How drear and awful is this solitude!Nature herself is surely dead, and o'erHer cold and stiffened corse a winding sheet,Of bright unsullied purity, is thrown.How still she lies! she smiles, she breathes no more;Yon drooping elm, whose pale and leafless boughsO'erhang the stream, hath wept itself to death.The stream that once did gaily dance and singThe livelong day, now, stiff and silent, liesImmovable—congealed to glittering shingles,'Tis beautiful in death! That grove, which lateDid woo the merry stream with ceaseless music,From morn till eve, with notes of thousand songsters,And all the night with those melodious strainsWith which lone Philomela tells her love,Now silent stands a bleached skeleton.The sky itself is shrouded; now no moreThe rosy blush of health, the glow of rapture,Or cheerful smile of peace her face illumines;One sickly livid hue is spread o'er all.The veil of air, wont not to hide, but showWith mild and softening azure tint more sweetThe beauteous aspect of the varying heaven,Is now become a foul and dense disguise.The sun, that glorious source of warmth and light,Arrested in his course, flares through the dunAnd turbid atmosphere, as if expiring.Nought else appears—it seems as though this spotWere all creation, and myself the soleSurvivor. Oh! how awful thus to findMyself alone with God—to know and feelThat His all-seeing, His all-searching eye,Surveys my inmost thoughts! How little, now,Appears the mighty joys, the hopes and fears,Pursuits and pleasures of a transient world!A world within, till now, like other men,I've toiled and grieved, with many anxious cares,But where I too have loved and been beloved,With more of happiness than oft is foundIn this probationary state. With HimWho gave me all and day by day, hath still,With kind parental care, my life preserved;To stand alone is awful, but not dreadful. Nay, sure, 'tis more than earthly bliss, here, thusTo hold communion with my heavenly Father.Witness this heart, with gratitude o'ercharged,Which pleads and presses to present its thanks:Witness these tears which thus uncalled obtrude,And half congealed, fall to the frozen earth,An humble offering at the throne of grace:Witness this sweet, serene, and holy calm,At once bespeaking and befitting forThe presence of my Maker, semblance faintOf happiness to come, when bliss supremeShall be the portion of these ransomed saints,Who through eternity shall join to raiseLoud hallelujahs to their heavenly King.