Page:Poems of nature, Thoreau, 1895.djvu/106

 SMOKE IN WINTER

sluggish smoke curls up from some deep dell,

The stiffened air exploring in the dawn,

And making slow acquaintance with the day;

Delaying now upon its heavenward course,

In wreathed loiterings dallying with itself,

With as uncertain purpose and slow deed,

As its half-wakened master by the hearth,

Whose mind, still slumbering, and sluggish thoughts

Have not yet swept into the onward current

Of the new day;—and now it streams afar,

The while the chopper goes with step direct,

And mind intent to wield the early axe.

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