The day was drawing to a close, and the shadows creeping across the garden were long and dark, for the sun had graciously agreed to put in an appearance in the wild west Highlands of Scotland… at least for an hour or two, before it hurried off to illuminate warmer climes.
The low, bright light drew Algy's attention to a clump of multicoloured crocuses which he had not visited before, and as he rested beside the glowing flowers for a few minutes before retiring to a warmer perch for the night, he thought of all his friends in the northern hemisphere who had been experiencing weeks or even months of continual snow and ice, and recalled the first stanzas of a poem he had read some time ago.
So for all those friends who have been waiting and longing for winter to come to an end, Algy once again recites these verses, and hopes that the spell of cold and darkness will now be broken for you all:
For ages on our river borders,
These tassels in their tawny bloom,
And willowy studs of downy silver,
Have prophesied of Spring to come.
For ages have the unbound waters
Smiled on them from their pebbly hem,
And the clear carol of the robin
And song of bluebird welcomed them.
But never yet from smiling river,
Or song of early bird, have they
Been greeted with a gladder welcome
Than whispers from my heart to-day.
They break the spell of cold and darkness,
The weary watch of sleepless pain;
And from my heart, as from the river,
The ice of winter melts again.
[Algy is quoting the first four stanzas of the poem The First Flowers by the 19th century American Quaker poet and abolitionist John Greenleaf Whittier.]
