---#19 by little-whip
Wed, August 23, 2006 06:57 AM---

Your poem reminded me of my grandfather. He hated cold weather, always complained about it. If it got below 70 he would need a heavy coat.

One day while looking out his window he said," I hope it snows."

I said, "Why? You hate the snow, Grandpa."

He said, "I don't hate the snow I hate the cold. I love the snow, it covers everything that is ugly outside."

I thought to myself, "My grandpa is so cool."

Ever since then I always thought of his words during every snowfall.

Great poem, Whip.

"Midwinter spring is its own season
Sempiternal though sodden towards sundown,
Suspended in time, between pole and tropic.
When the short day is brightest, with frost and fire,
The brief sun flames the ice, on pond and ditches,
In windless cold that is the heart's heat,
Reflecting in a watery mirror
A glare that is blindness in the early afternoon.
And glow more intense than blaze of branch, or brazier,
Stirs the dumb spirit: no wind, but pentecostal fire..."

---T.S. Eliot, Little Gidding (1st of the 4 Quartets)


I like the late winter/early spring time of year.

In England - Autumn. In Virginia - Winter. I've never seen an American Autumn (I've never liked the use of the word Fall - though that's certainly descriptively accurate) in the places famous for it so I can't comment. Here in Virginia there's so far been very little to distinguish Autumn from Winter - though the two seasons taken together are blessedly less humid than Spring and Summer. Some leaves do fall, yes. But not that many. The temperature drops, but not to a really significant degree - though the natives do complain.

Virginia reminds me (because it's so different) of the things I miss about England - the weather in Autumn and Winter, and the landscape of the north-east coast, especially between the Humber and the Tyne.