‘The February Hush’ by Thomas Wentworth Higginson

A 19th century social reformer, Unitarian minister and human rights advocate, essayist, poet… And Emily Dickinson’s friend and mentor. We’ve encountered Thomas Wentworth Higginson before on this blog, but if you need a quick refresher, click here.

While Dickinson’s poems can be rather cryptic and difficult to interpret, Higginson’s feel like a painting: using highly evocative words, he helps us form a mental picture of a scene, immersing us in the moment.

That’s also the case with the poem featured in this post, ‘The February Hush’. Reading it, you immediately find yourself in a wintery nature setting. What’s described is just a fleeting moment: a wonderful snapshot captured in words. 

Enjoy it — and if you’re an English language learner, don’t skip the simple vocabulary exercise below the poem! (Answer key available.)

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Snow o’er the darkening moorlands,
Flakes fill the quiet air;
Drifts in the forest hollows,
And a soft mask everywhere.
The nearest twig on the pine-tree
Looks blue through the whitening sky,
And the clinging beech-leaves rustle
Though never a wind goes by.
But there’s red on the wildrose berries,
And red in the lovely glow
On the cheeks of the child beside me,
That once were pale, like snow.

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VOCABULARY EXERCISE

Match the following definitions or synonyms with the words in the poem:

• to make a soft, crackling sound (verb)
• a large mass of snow (noun)
• to produce bright light (verb)
• a small offshoot from a branch (noun)
• side of the face below the eye and above the jaw (noun)
• a wide area of open land, often covered with heather, moss and bracken (noun)
• very light coloured (adjective)
• a hole or empty space; a valley (noun) 

To check your answers, please click here.

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NOTES

This post is available for download in the PDF format.

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COVER IMAGE CREDIT

Photo by Galina N on Unsplash