Winter’s End and February’s Secrets: Poetic and Witty Words for the Season

February 18, 2020

This time of year carries a quiet, sometimes somber beauty, reflected in the words of poets and writers who capture the dwindling light and the potent stillness of February and winter’s embrace.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the celebrated American poet, paints a stark, wintry scene in An Afternoon in February:

The day is ending,
The night is descending;
The marsh is frozen,

The river is dead.

This closing of day and stillness of water calls to mind the hush of nature preparing for rest and renewal.

Patricia Briggs, known for her fantasy writing, offers a wry observation on human behavior and the changing seasons:

A man says a lot of things in summer he doesn't mean in winter.

Her words remind us how the warmth of summer can inspire careless talk, while winter’s chill brings a different kind of reflection.

William Wordsworth, the English Romantic poet, in his poem To the Same Flower, reflects on the celandine, a flower wrapped in medieval lore—said to have healing juice dropped by mother birds into fledglings’ eyes:

Pleasures newly found are sweet
When they lie about our feet:
February last, my heart
First at sight of thee was glad;
All unheard of as thou art,
Thou must needs, I think, have had,
Celandine!
And long ago.
Praise of which I nothing know.

The celandine embodies the quiet joys discovered at the edges of winter, small promises that herald spring’s arrival.

Will Rogers brings humor to the season’s challenges with his sharp wit:

I was just thinking if it is really religion with these nudist colonies, they sure must turn atheists in the wintertime.

A playful nod to the realities of winter’s chill.

Finally, George Ellis’ whimsical list of the months reminds us of the year’s varied moods and the vivid, sometimes playful, character of each season:

The twelve months…
Snowy, Flowy, Blowy,
Showery, Flowery, Bowery,
Hoppy, Croppy, Droppy,
Breezy, Sneezy, Freezy.

These voices together offer a tapestry of late winter’s essence—its starkness, its humor, its hidden joys, and its promise.