Victorian Violet Press
The Winter Garden
This garden path so thick with ashen frost
Seems like some Arctic road across the snow,
Where only ice ghosts in the darkness go
And ride the winds by icy tempests tossed.
I look in sadness at so great a cost,
Where all is barren, no more flowers grow,
Where once was life and color that would blow
Across these beds the ices sheets have embossed.
I watch forlorn, and heave a silent sigh,
The North Wind rules from out his pallid throne,
No tears he sheds, there’s ice in his lone eye,
His heart, as always, cold as frigid stone,
All bend and break to his harsh rule, this king,
While I will search for but the ghost of Spring.
The Cottage in Winter
My beard now paler than this window rime
That runs in streaks like pretty tatted lace,
And there like fox and hounds in some mad chase,
The snow flakes swirl in patterns near sublime,
The storm wind howls, I hear no distant chime,
As once I heard in youth, nor can I trace
The Past which teeming years obscure, erase,
Here by my hearth, a prisoner of Time.
Adown the years the Past is trumpeting,
The images they come, half formed, they speak
Of old lost loves, and love’s enduring sting.
I see the battle plains, tall ships of teak,
Yet all these memories great Time has thinned,
I see no more, but hear the howling wind.
Mike Fantina
