Classic Poem

Last night the winds came clamoring at the pane,
late, but with dawn as yet a baleful dream——
with midnight now a wild tale told with scream
and threat, its vehemence immune from strain,
its import blasting all that man would feign,
driving him home abashed before the theme,
and making night a void, but for the gleam
of streetlamps. Now the winds flung wide the rain,
and suddenly the first of all the snows,
the flakes raking the window with loud lash,
as if to taunt. I opened wide the sash,
I faced the flakes as one who faces foes.
I stood there long, not trying to evade
the chilly symbols. I was not afraid.

I scorned the void of self, as that of night.
I welcomed every flake that lashed my face.
What of a wintry flurry to the space
left desolate of anything to blight?
What of the fact that I should find delight
in symbols deathly, deadly, or find grace——
find peace in all that ever could replace
the petals of the rose in playful flight?
For as I lingered looking on the storm,
my dead love stood outside and playfully
strewed handfulls of white petals over me——
petals all fresh, all redolent, all warm.
I cannot hate the winds that strew the snows——
the ghostly petals of the perished rose.