Winter and Summer

In Winter when the air is chill,
    And winds are blowing loud and shrill,
All snug and warm I sit and purr,
    Wrapped in my overcoat of fur.

In Summer quite the other way,
    I find it very hot all day,
But Human People do not care,
    For they have nice thin clothes to wear.

And does it not seem hard to you,
    When all the world is like a stew,
And I am much too warm to purr,
    I have to wear my Winter Fur?

Oliver Herford

Oliver Herford was born in England on December 2, 1860. He was a British-born American writer, artist, and illustrator, often referred to as 'The American Oscar Wilde' for his sharp wit and humorous works. Herford authored and illustrated many books for children and adults, contributing to magazines such as "The Criterion", "Life", and "Punch". He died on July 5, 1935, in France.

Oliver Herford

A Seal.

Oliver Herford, Simple Poetry

Arnold Bennett

Oliver Herford, Simple Poetry

Saint Paul

Oliver Herford, Simple Poetry

Gilbert K. Chesterton

Oliver Herford, Simple Poetry

English

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Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Summer And Winter.

It was a bright and cheerful afternoon,
Towards the end of the sunny month of June,
When the north wind congregates in crowds
The floating mountains of the silver clouds
From the horizon - and the stainless sky
Opens beyond them like eternity.
All things rejoiced beneath the sun; the weeds,
The river, and the corn-fields, and the reeds;
The willow leaves that glanced in the light breeze,
And the firm foliage of the larger trees.

It was a winter such as when birds die
In the deep forests; and the fishes lie
Stiffened in the translucent ice, which makes
Even the mud and slime of the warm lakes
A wrinkled clod as hard as brick; and when,
Among their children, comfortable men
Gather about great fires, and yet feel cold:
Alas, then, for the homeless begg...

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Winter Fancies

I

Winter without
    And warmth within;
The winds may shout
    And the storm begin;
The snows may pack
    At the window pane,
And the skies grow black,
    And the sun remain
Hidden away
    The livelong day -
But here - in here is the warmth of May!

II

Swoop your spitefullest
    Up the flue,
    Wild Winds - do!
What in the world do I care for you?
O delightfullest
    Weather of all,
    Howl and squall,
And shake the trees till the last leaves fall!

III

The joy one feels,
    In an easy chair,
Cocking his heels
    In the dancing air
That wreathes the rim of a roaring stove
Whose heat loves better than hearts can love,
Will not permit
    The coldest day
 ...

James Whitcomb Riley

The Winter's Come

Sweet chestnuts brown like soling leather turn;
The larch trees, like the colour of the Sun;
That paled sky in the Autumn seemed to burn,
What a strange scene before us now does run--
Red, brown, and yellow, russet, black, and dun;
White thorn, wild cherry, and the poplar bare;
The sycamore all withered in the sun.
No leaves are now upon the birch tree there:
All now is stript to the cold wintry air.

See, not one tree but what has lost its leaves--
And yet the landscape wears a pleasing hue.
The winter chill on his cold bed receives
Foliage which once hung oer the waters blue.
Naked and bare the leafless trees repose.
Blue-headed titmouse now seeks maggots rare,
Sluggish and dull the leaf-strewn river flows;
That is not green, which was so through the ye...

John Clare

Winter.

The small wind whispers through the leafless hedge
Most sharp and chill, where the light snowy flakes
Rest on each twig and spike of wither'd sedge,
Resembling scatter'd feathers;--vainly breaks
The pale split sunbeam through the frowning cloud,
On Winter's frowns below--from day to day
Unmelted still he spreads his hoary shroud,
In dithering pride on the pale traveller's way,
Who, croodling, hastens from the storm behind
Fast gathering deep and black, again to find
His cottage-fire and corner's sheltering bounds;
Where, haply, such uncomfortable days
Make musical the wood-sap's frizzling sounds,
And hoarse loud bellows puffing up the blaze.

John Clare

Spring

Winter is past; the heart of Nature warms
Beneath the wrecks of unresisted storms;
Doubtful at first, suspected more than seen,
The southern slopes are fringed with tender green;
On sheltered banks, beneath the dripping eaves,
Spring's earliest nurslings spread their glowing leaves,
Bright with the hues from wider pictures won,
White, azure, golden, - drift, or sky, or sun, -
The snowdrop, bearing on her patient breast
The frozen trophy torn from Winter's crest;
The violet, gazing on the arch of blue
Till her own iris wears its deepened hue;
The spendthrift crocus, bursting through the mould
Naked and shivering with his cup of gold.
Swelled with new life, the darkening elm on high
Prints her thick buds against the spotted sky
On all her boughs the stately ches...

Oliver Wendell Holmes

Summer

Winter is cold-hearted
    Spring is yea and nay,
Autumn is a weather-cock
    Blown every way:
Summer days for me
When every leaf is on its tree;

When Robin's not a beggar,
    And Jenny Wren's a bride,
And larks hang singing, singing, singing,
    Over the wheat-fields wide,
    And anchored lilies ride,
And the pendulum spider
    Swings from side to side,

And blue-black beetles transact business,
    And gnats fly in a host,
And furry caterpillars hasten
    That no time be lost,
And moths grow fat and thrive,
And ladybirds arrive.

Before green apples blush,
    Before green nuts embrown,
Why, one day in the country
    Is worth a month in town;
    Is worth a day and a year
Of the dusty, musty, lag...

Christina Georgina Rossetti