The Snow Storm (1859), William Morris Hunt

Announced by all the trumpets of the sky,
Arrives the snows, and driving o’er the fields,
Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air
Hides hills and woods, the river and the heaven,
And veils the farm-house at the garden’s end.

                                             Ralph Waldo Emerson, “The Snow-Storm”

Dale F. writes:

Great—if disturbing—image, and wonderful poem by Emerson. I wasn’t familiar with either one. Am I misreading the painting? It appears to be of a woman overwhelmed by the storm and the snow, with an infant clutched in her arms, apparently on the verge of death. The poem on the other hand is celebratory and a joy to read.

Laura writes:

Yes, that is a woman clutching an infant in a storm. It is a haunting image. You’re right, the poem does not fit the scene. I was working on a longer snow-related entry, but because of Christmas-week activity could not finish it. I hurriedly posted this, never thinking that a reader would be cheeky enough to point to the contradiction. : – )

Here is Emerson’s full poem, which does speak of the savagery of snow too:

The Snow-Storm

Announced by all the trumpets of the sky,
Arrives the snow, and, driving o’er the fields,
Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air
Hides hill and woods, the river, and the heaven,
And veils the farmhouse at the garden’s end.
The sled and traveller stopped, the courier’s feet
Delated, all friends shut out, the housemates sit
Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed
In a tumultuous privacy of storm.
Come see the north wind’s masonry.
Out of an unseen quarry evermore
Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer
Curves his white bastions with projected roof
Round every windward stake, or tree, or door.
Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work
So fanciful, so savage, nought cares he
For number or proportion. Mockingly,
On coop or kennel he hangs Parian wreaths;
A swan-like form invests the hiddden thorn;
Fills up the famer’s lane from wall to wall,
Maugre the farmer’s sighs; and at the gate
A tapering turret overtops the work.
And when his hours are numbered, and the world
Is all his own, retiring, as he were not,
Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art
To mimic in slow structures, stone by stone,
Built in an age, the mad wind’s night-work,
The frolic architecture of the snow.

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