To Elizabeth Ward Perkins by Amy Lowell

Dear Bessie, would my tired rhyme / Had force to rise from apathy, / And shaking off its lethargy / Ring word-tones like a Christmas chime.

But in my soul's high belfry, chill / The bitter wind of doubt has blown, / The summer swallows all have flown, / The bells are frost-bound, mute and still.

Upon the crumbling boards the snow / Has drifted deep, the clappers hang / Prismed with icicles, their clang / Unheard since ages long ago.

The rope I pull is stiff and cold, / My straining ears detect no sound / Except a sigh, as round and round / The wind rocks through the timbers old.

Below, I know the church is bright / With haloed tapers, warm with prayer; / But here I only feel the air / Of icy centuries of night.

Beneath my feet the snow is lit / And gemmed with colours, red, and blue, / Topaz, and green, where light falls through / The saints that in the windows sit.

Here darkness seems a spectred thing, / Voiceless and haunting, while the stars / Mock with a light of long dead years / The ache of present suffering.

Silent and winter-killed I stand, / No carol hymns my debt to you; / But take this frozen thought in lieu, / And thaw its music in your hand.