Though I am silent There is singing around me. Though I am dark There is vision around me. Though I am heavy There is flight around me.

Indoors or out, no one relaxes in March, that month of wind and taxes, the wind will presently disappear, the taxes last us all the year.

The whistle of a boat Calls and cries unendingly, Like some lost child In tears and trouble Hunting the harbor's breast And the harbor's eyes.

All pleasures and all pains, remembering The bough of summer and the winter branch. These are the measures destined for her soul. 

All Thoughts, all Passions, all Delights, Whatever stirs this mortal Frame, All are but Ministers of Love, And feed this sacred flame. 

What a field-day for the heat A thousand people in the street Singing songs and carrying signs Mostly say, hooray for our side.

Winter migrants gather In long black lines Along a silver sleek Heads held back, Throats Thrust toward An onshore rush.

I raise up my voice — not so I can shout, but so that those without a voice can be heard . . . we cannot succeed when half of us are held back.

Be not defeated by the rain, Nor let the wind prove your better. Succumb not to the snows of winter. Nor be bested by the heat of summer.

Today we woke up to a revolution of snow, Its white flag waving over everything, The landscape vanished, Not a single mouse to punctuate the blankness.

With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin, Without any doubting or quiddit, He started to sing as he tackled the thing That couldn’t be done, and he did it.

I heard the bells on Christmas Day Their old, familiar carols play And wild and sweet the words repeat Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

On the first day of winter, the earth awakens to the cold touch of itself. Snow knows no other recourse except This falling, this sudden letting go.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas Ev’rywhere you go, There’s a tree in the Grand Hotel, one in the park as well, It’s the sturdy kind that doesn’t mind the snow.

I have been one acquainted with the night I have walked out in rain — and back in rain I have out-walked the furthest city light.

This morning I ask only The blessing of the crayfish, The beautitude of the birds; To wear the skin of the bear In my songs; To work like a man with my hands.

Twisting, turning through the air Till all the trees stand stark and bare. Exhausted, drop to earth below To wait, like children, for the snow.

Pressed between yellow leaves of a book that has never been opened. And the way up is the way down, the way forward is the way back.

Elections belong to the people. It’s their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.

Mornings crisp as carrot sticks With trees the tone of chimney-bricks; The sun sets, brilliant tangerine, As pumpkins grin for Halloween.