DECEMBER DAYS 



Silent and moveless cascades of ice 

 veil the rocky steeps where in more 

 genial days tiny rivulets dripped down 

 the ledges and mingled their musical 

 tinkle with the songs of birds and the 

 flutter of green leaves. 



Winter berries and bittersweet still 

 give here and there a fleck of bright 

 color to the universal gray and dun of 

 the trees, and the carpet of cast-off 

 leaves and the dull hue of the evergreens 

 but scarcely relieve the sombreness of 

 the woodland landscape. 



Spanning forest and field with a low 

 flat arch of even gray, hangs a sky as 

 cold as the landscape it domes and whose 

 mountain borders lie hidden in its hazy 

 foundations. Through this canopy of 

 suspended snow the low noontide sun 

 shows but a blotch of yellowish gray, ray- 

 less and giving forth no warmth, and, 

 as it slants toward its brief decline, grows 

 yet dimmer till it is quite blotted out in 

 the gloom of the half-spent afternoon. 



The expectant hush that broods over 



the forlorn and naked earth is broken 



only by the twitter of a flock of snow 



buntings which, like a straight - blown 



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