Classic Poem

It was near the end of winter and mild as mild could be,
When a renter started westward with wife and children three,
Going forth to seek a homestead on the praries bare and lone—
For the poor man hungered sorely for a place to call his own.

The wind blew soft and balmy, the day was bright and fair;
The spring was stealing northward and her breath was in the air.
Like starting on a picnic—so high their spirits rose—
Seemed that journey's fair beginning—could they have seen its close!

Slow crept the wagon westward. A week of pleasant days,
Then came one dark gray morning. A strangely brooding haze
Hung o'er the lonely country, its curtain vague and dim,
And hid the palid sunlight and hid the prairie's rim.

“Best stay in cover stranger, I'm sure you're welcome quite.”
Thus spoke the kind old farmer where they had spent the night.
“That gray film over yonder, that queer look in the sky—
I know the signs: then tarry, and let the storm go by.”

With thanks for proffered kindness, they still must needs be gone.
'Twas “not so bad a morning, when all was said and done.”
Alas for rash impatience; it can not brook to wait,
But shuts its eyes all blindly and rushes on its fate.

Slow crept the wagon westward; and still that filmy veil
Hung o'er the red-brown prairie, so ghastly, dim and pale.
A sound like rushing pinions—a moment, and no more—
Then came the freezing norther, with savage shriek and roar.

Cold blew the wind, and colder, like bits or sharpened stone,
The fine snow pierced their garments and chilled them to the bone.
Out on the lonely prairie, that seemed of life bereft—
Alack! and O! alack for the shelter they had left.

The early twilight fell and night was closing fast,
When through the swirling tempest they spied a light at last.
The children tried to shout with their numb and stiffened lips,
And clapped their little hands with the freezing finger tips.

'Twas the dwelling snug and warm of a farmer well-to-do.
“Can we stop here for the night, and till the storm is through?”
In the doorway stood the speaker, a vision wild and weird,
With white frost on his eyebrows, and ice hung on his beard.

As he spoke he glanced within at the warm and lamplit room,
At the young and comely woman, at the children in their bloom,
Never doubting of the answer, full trusting—more the shame—
To him, the stony hearted, from whom the answer came.

“I don't keep tavern, stranger, and spare room have we none;
You'll find a place, I reckon, some three miles further on.”
No other word was spoken; the poor man turned away
With pale lips tense and set, and with face of ashen gray.

No time was there for parley, and no use had there been;
He saw no ray of pity in the gaze so cold and keen.
He rushed back to the wagon; said, “three miles yet to go!”
He had found that human hearts could be colder than the snow.

The children huddled closer, the shivering mother pressed
Beneath her shawl the youngest still closer to her breast.
One sad, resentful look towards the warm and glowing light,
And the man whipped up his horses, so they passed into the night.

Through the storm and drift and darkness did the swaying wagon reel.
While the farmer asked a blessing on the smoking evening meal.
Later, he read his bible (the cruel hypocrit!)
And prayed for preservation from the dangers of the night.


On hard drifts, pure and sparkling, the sun shone calmly down,
When a chilling, startling item was wired from town to town,
“A family found frozen.” Then, later, it was told
How a farmer had refused them a shelter from the cold.

The farmer—now how fares he? Mayhap he prospers still,
With corn heaped in his cribs, and with money in his till;
But I wonder if his pulses do always calmly beet,
And if his food is pleasant, and if his sleep is sweet.