Classic Poem

Draw close the curtain on the streaming pane!
Our hearts are heavy with the cheerless night;
Shut out the tumult of the wind and rain,
Shut out the cold and dark, shut in the light!

See, love, the gracious glow on wall and floor!
Here, at the noon-mark of these golden gleams,
We may forget the winter out of door,
And lose ourselves in pleasant summer dreams.

Here, islanded in calm, we may forget
The outer life of stormy cares and aims;
And all that makes its struggle and regret
May be to us no more than empty names.

Shut out the bleak world and the troubled sky!
Shut in our love, our loneliness and peace!
Though winter storms be out and winds be high,
The summer in our hearts need never cease.