I stopped this morning to admire
A row of icicles in sun
And watched prismatic colors run
About them like a restless fire,
Where bars of silver, cold and bright,
Had caged a leaping flame of light.
But by this noon the spell was gone.
Only the gutter’s iron lip
And water’s rusty, measured drip
Gossiped of that imprisoned dawn
And hinted that tonight would make
Another jail for day to break.
The Saturday Evening Post, November 20, 1954