Ice Age

I hear a lark ascending, close my eyes –

I open them again to gloom and rain;

Like shutters opened, closed, sunset, sunrise,

And then the dark, and then the light again.

Why do my days collapse within the hour?

What makes a night of day and day of night?

Is that the sun I see within the bower,

Or does the moon ascend from mind to sight?

I want it now, that age of ice foretold –

I want to laugh at winter and the dark –

I want to live a thousand years of cold

And while it bites recall that unseen lark.

So there it rises, cloud and midnight visible,

Sans sinking of the mind the sun finds risible.