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Labor and the Angel

Chapter 39: WINTER SONG.
By Duncan Campbell Scott
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Poetry

About This Book

A collection of lyrical and narrative poems that intertwine rural and natural imagery with meditations on work, love, and moral responsibility. Poems depict harvests, seasonal change, and small lives—often pairing intimate domestic scenes with broader social observation—while recurring angelic and spiritual motifs frame labor as both suffering and sacred duty. Several sequences offer seasonal songs and short dramatic narratives; others turn to elegiac or reflective moods, addressing poverty, endurance, consolation, and the consolatory powers of love and service. The tone ranges from vivid sensory description to moral and communal critique, united by plain diction and musical cadence.

WINTER SONG.

Sing me a song of the dead world,
Of the great frost deep and still,
Of the sword of fire the wind hurled
On the iron hill.
Sing me a song of the driving snow,
Of the reeling cloud and the smoky drift,
Where the sheeted wraiths like ghosts go
Through the gloomy rift.
Sing me a song of the ringing blade,
Of the snarl and shatter the light ice makes,
Of the whoop and the swing of the snow-shoe raid
Through the cedar brakes.
Sing me a song of the apple-loft,
Of the corn and the nuts and the mounds of meal,
Of the sweeping whir of the spindle soft,
And the spinning-wheel.
Sing me a song of the open page,
Where the ruddy gleams of the firelight dance,
Where bends my love Armitage,
Reading an old romance.
Sing me a song of the still nights,
Of the large stars steady and high,
The aurora darting its phosphor lights
In the purple sky.