A group of writers sat about in the dead

of winter’s snow,

Around a fire burning embers only,

giving off smoke and glow. 

There was one, who sat so silent still,

observing his fellow

Writers, who exclaimed how tedious and

how torturously slow

Came the muse of poetic inspiration 

to demonstrate and show

Them the words and verse they ought to inscribe 

and knit and stitch and sew

Upon the fabric of stitchless time

to warm the souls below

With a quilted work of God wrought by man

for man’s own perusal. 

That one saw and spoke not a word but thought

to himself thus and so:

When they go off to write a verse or prose,

they writhe and speak thus so:

“It is laborious and difficult 

and gloriously so!”

They speak as if never beauty had they

seen descend here below,

Seeking to wrench the words from the heavens 

and produce a simple flow

Of pretty pictures painted upon the page

for display and gaudy show,

But beheld the beauty they have not yet,

for still thus are they slow

To comprehend the beauty from above

in their language low.

Grasping at the images of heaven,

they grasp at nothing at all,

And still they wait for inspiration,

But short of beauty they fall. 

The cold winter chill bit and tore and clawed

with fierce and mighty blow 

After blow, casting all but the one in-

to a horrible throe. 

The watching one still sat, observing still

each one of his fellow

Writers writhing all about in the cold,

cast about in the snow.

But the silent sitting one remained with-

in his seat, even though

The cold winter chill bit and tore and clawed

with each blow after blow

At his clothing and flesh and bones, even

at his very soul. 

Sat he still in his place like a statute 

and took blow after blow

Till it was one he became with the cold

and with the icy snow.