Page:Poems, Household Edition, Emerson, 1904.djvu/269

 THE TITMOUSE

shall not be overbold

When you deal with arctic cold,

As late I found my lukewarm blood

Chilled wading in the snow-choked wood.

How should I fight? my foeman fine

Has million arms to one of mine:

East, west, for aid I looked in vain,

East, west, north, south, are his domain.

Miles off, three dangerous miles, is home;

Must borrow his winds who there would come.

Up and away for life! be fleet!—

The frost-king ties my fumbling feet,

Sings in my ears, my hands are stones,

Curdles the blood to the marble bones,

Tugs at the heart-strings, numbs the sense,

And hems in life with narrowing fence.

Well, in this broad bed lie and sleep,—

The punctual stars will vigil keep,—

Embalmed by purifying cold;

The winds shall sing their dead-march old,

The snow is no ignoble shroud,

The moon thy mourner, and the cloud.