Poem for Sunday and Ancient Masonic Tradition

January
By Helen Hunt Jackson

O Winter! frozen pulse and heart of fire,
What loss is theirs who from thy kingdom turn
Dismayed, and think thy snow a sculptured urn
Of death! Far sooner in midsummer tire
The streams than under ice. June could not hire
Her roses to forego the strength they learn
In sleeping on thy breast. No fires can burn
The bridges thou dost lay where men desire
In vain to build.
        O Heart, when Love's sun goes
To northward, and the sounds of singing cease,
Keep warm by inner fires, and rest in peace.
Sleep on content, as sleeps the patient rose.
Walk boldly on the white untrodden snows,
The winter is the winter's own release.

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This was Saturday's Poem of the Day at The Academy of American Poets.

We had a quiet Saturday morning due to the tiny amount of snow that fell on Friday night, which left ice on the street and walks until around noon when the temperatures went above freezing. Older son slept very late, since he goes back to college on Monday and presumably his days of sleeping till nearly noon will be over; younger son got up to take photos of the snow and to visit friends. After lunch, very much against his will, we dragged older son out to get him a suit to wear to my niece's Bat Mitzvah next month and to get some more pants, since he had perhaps three pairs that fit. He was woeful and when we ran into my oldest friend in Target, I was afraid she was going to call child protective services for the torture we were inflicting on son in the sportswear department.

I have to find a dress for this Bat Mitzvah and am so discouraged by everything I've seen in local stores that I think looking at vintage is in order. Son wanted good pizza while he was home, so we got pizza from the local place he likes and spent the evening watching Blackadder -- the end of the Regency series and most of the WWI episodes. Here are some more photos from the George Washington Masonic Memorial, this time not Washington souvenirs but Masonic symbolism like faux Egyptian relics and things from King Solomon's Temple (including the Holy Grail) as well as some Crusader and Templar items: