the midday sun
I needlessly rattle my pots and pans as I cook , and I sing at the top of my voice . It is spring . Yesterday I stood on a hillock and looked out across the wintry woods . They have a different expression now ; they have gone gray and bedraggled , and the midday sun has thawed down the snow and diminished it . There are catkins everywhere , drifts of them in the underbrush , looking like letters of the alphabet piled in a heap . The moon rises , the stars break forth . I am cold and shiver a little , but I have nothing to do in the hut , and prefer to shiver as long as possible .