Louis MacNeice: "Snow"

The room was suddenly rich and the great bay-window was
Spawning snow and pink roses against it
Soundlessly collateral and incompatible:
World is suddener than we fancy it.

World is crazier and more of it than we think,
Incorrigibly plural. I peel and portion
A tangerine and spit the pips and feel
The drunkenness of things being various.

And the fire flames with a bubbling sound for world
Is more spiteful and gay than one supposes—
On the tongue on the eyes on the ears in the palms of one's hands—
There is more than glass between the snow and the huge roses.

                                                                                             January, 1935

"Snow" by Louis MacNeice, from Collected Poems. © Louis MacNeice, 2002.

Photography credit: "First Snow of the Season," by Ann Torrence © 2008 (originally color).