Das Krist Kindel by James Whitcomb Riley — Read

I had fed the fire and stirred it, till the sparkles in delight / Snapped their saucy little fingers at the chill December night; / And in dressing-gown and slippers, I had tilted back "my throne" -- / The old split-bottomed rocker -- and was musing all alone.

I could hear the hungry Winter prowling round the outer door, / And the tread of muffled footsteps on the white piazza floor; / But the sounds came to me only as the murmur of a stream / That mingled with the current of a lazy-flowing dream.