Frost at Midnight

The Frost performs its secret ministry,Unhelp'd by any wind. The owlet's cryCame loud—and hark, again! loud as before.The inmates of my cottage, all at rest,Have left me to that solitude, which suitsAbstruser musings: save that at my sideMy cradled infant slumbers peacefully.'Tis calm indeed! so calm, that it disturbsAnd vexes meditation with its strangeAnd extreme silentness. Sea, hill, and wood.This populous village! Sea, and hill, and wood,With all the numberless goings on of life,Inaudible as dreams! the thin blue flameLies on my low burnt fire, and quivers not;Only that film, which flutter'd on the grate,Still flutters there, the sole unquiet thing.Methinks, its motion in this hush of natureGives it dim sympathies with me who live,Making it a companionable form,

To which the living spirit in our frame,That loves not to behold a lifeless thing,Transfuses its own pleasures, its own will.

How oft, at school, with most believing mind,Presageful, have I gaz'd upon the bars,To watch that fluttering stranger! and as oftWith unclosed lids, already had I dreamtOf my sweet birth-place; and the old church-tower,Whose bells, the poor man's only music, rangFrom morn to evening, all the hot Fair-day,)So sweetly, that they stirred and haunted meWith a wild) pleasure, falling on mine earMost like articulate sounds of things to come!So gaz'd I, till the soothing things, I dreamt,Lull'd me to sleep, and sleep prolong'd my dreams!And so I brooded all the following morn,Aw'd by the stern preceptor's face, mine eyeFix'd with mock study on my swimming book:Save if the door half open'd, and I snatch'dA hasty glance, and still my heart leapt up,For still I hop'd to see the stranger's face,Townsman, or aunt, or sister more beloved,My play-mate when we both were cloth'd alike!

Dear Babe, that sleepest cradled by my side,Whose gentle breathings, heard in this deep) calm,Fill) up the interspersed vacanciesAnd momentary pauses of the thought!My Babe so beautiful! it thrills) my heartWith tender gladness, thus to look at thee,And think that thou shalt learn far other loreAnd in far other scenes! For I was rear'dIn the great city, pent 'mid cloisters dim,And saw nought lovely but the sky and stars.But thou, my babe! shalt wander like a breezeBy lakes and sandy shores, beneath the cragsOf ancient mountain, and beneath the cloudsWhich image in their bulk both lakes and shoresAnd mountain crags: so shalt thou see and hearThe lovely shapes and sounds intelligibleOf that eternal language, which thy GodUtters, who from eternity doth teachHimself in all, and all things in himself.Great universal Teacher! he shall mouldThy spirit, and by giving make it ask.

Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee,Whether the summer clothe the general earthWith greenness, or the redbreast sit and sing

Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branchOf mossy apple-tree, while the nigh thatchSmokes in the sun-thaw; whether the eve-drops fall,Heard only in the Trances) of the blast,Or if the secret ministry of frostShall hang them up in silent icicles,Quietly shining to the quiet Moon.