The First Snow-Fall

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1. The snow had begun in the gloaming,
2. And busily all the night
3. Had been heaping field and highway
4. With a silence deep and white.
5.  
6. Every pine and fir and hemlock
7. Wore ermine too dear for an earl,
8. And the poorest twig on the elm-tree
9. Was ridged inch-deep with pearl.
10.  
11.  
12. From sheds new-roofed with Carrara
13. Came Chanticleer's muffled crow,
14. The stiff rails were softened to swan's-down,
15. And still fluttered down the snow.
16.  
17. I stood and watched by the window
18. The noiseless work of the sky,
19. And the sudden flurries of snow-birds,
20. Like brown leaves whirling by.
21.  
22. I thought of a mound in sweet Auburn
23. Where a little headstone stood;
24. How the flakes were folding it gently,
25. As did robins the babes in the wood.
26.  
27. Up spoke our own little Mabel,
28. Saying, "Father, who makes it snow?"
29. And I told of the good All-father
30. Who cares for us here below.
31.  
32. Again I looked at the snow-fall,
33. And thought of the leaden sky
34. That arched o'er our first great sorrow,
35. When that mound was heaped so high.
36.  
37. I remembered the gradual patience
38. That fell from that cloud like snow,
39. Flake by flake, healing and hiding
40. The scar of our deep-plunged woe.
41.  
42. And again to the child I whispered,
43. "The snow that husheth all,
44. Darling, the merciful Father
45. Alone can make it fall!"
46.  
47.  
48. Then, with eyes that saw not, I kissed her;
49. And she, kissing back, could not know
50. That _my_ kiss was given to her sister,
51. Folded close under deepening snow.