Sonnet Clv: Poem by George Henry Boker

Heavy and dark, with gusts of spiteful snow,
The moody moments of today lagged by;
And when the boding evening gathered nigh
The buzzing swarms of winter, thick and slow,
Whitened the earth and eddied to and fro,
In whirling currents of the breathing sky;
Until the ghastly land appeared to lie
Stiff as a corpse beneath its sheet of woe.
But why should I above wan nature's bier,
Mourning her sorrow with another grief,
Find in the act a selfish heart's relief?
I play the trickster: every sigh and tear
Is mere distraction, shallow, false, and brief,
And masks a woe I dare not venture near.