Tabla de contenidos para Winter 2022 en Siegfried

Siegfried in winter is frost and wool, fire and tong. It is the sight of rabbits, the smell of fire, the sound of ice. Siegfried in winter is stomping your boots on the porch after a walk through the snow, your scarf, gloves, and hat laid to dry in front of the fire. It is kedgeree for dinner and mince pies for dessert while Mahalia Jackson sings "Silent Night" on the radio. It is last year’s Christmas tree burning in the fireplace. It is Christmas cake with icing and sherry on a silver tray. It is a mandarin orange in the toe of your stocking. Siegfried in winter is a barn warmed by mule and cow, their breath and the smell of the hay mingling into the vision of a…

White are the far-off plains, and whiteThe fading forests grow;The wind dies out along the height,And denser still the snow,A gathering weight on roof and tree,Falls down scarce audibly. The road before me smooths and fillsApace, and all aboutThe fences dwindle, and the hillsAre blotted slowly out;The naked trees loom spectrallyInto the dim white sky. The meadows and far-sheeted streamsLie still without a sound;Like some soft minister of dreamsThe snow-fall hoods me round;In wood and water, earth and air,A silence everywhere. Save when at lonely intervalsSome farmer’s sleigh, urged on,With rustling runners and sharp bells,Swings by me and is gone;Or from the empty waste I hearA sound remote and clear; The barking of a dog, or callTo cattle, sharply pealed,Borne echoing from some wayside stallOr barnyard far a-field;Then all is…

I leant upon a coppice gateWhen Frost was spectre-grey,And Winter's dregs made desolateThe weakening eye of day.The tangled bine-stems scored the skyLike strings of broken lyres,And all mankind that haunted nighHad sought their household fires. The land's sharp features seemed to beThe Century's corpse outleant,His crypt the cloudy canopy,The wind his death-lament.The ancient pulse of germ and birthWas shrunken hard and dry,And every spirit upon earthSeemed fervourless as I. At once a voice arose amongThe bleak twigs overheadIn a full-hearted evensongOf joy illimited;An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,In blast-beruffled plume,Had chosen thus to fling his soulUpon the growing gloom. So little cause for carolingsOf such ecstatic soundWas written on terrestrial thingsAfar or nigh around,That I could think there trembled throughHis happy good-night airSome blessed Hope, whereof he knewAnd I…

If we were in the midst of convivial company, a good meal ahead and a warm fire behind us, I would pour you some celebratory champagne to toast this first issue of Siegfried. In your hands you hold a dream made real in paper and ink, pixel and byte. It is the dream of all my selves: the child enamoured of All Creatures Great and Small; the teenager whose fast, unwavering friends were Beverley Nichols and Barbara Pym; the young adult who yearned to stay in university, if only to always walk across her campus square when autumn light lit up the spires and because scholarship was embedded in every brick. And the adult who lost her father, her dearest fellow reader, and named Siegfried after the literary character he…

Archibald Lampman was a Canadian poet of the nineteenth century. Born in the southern Ontario town of Morpeth on November 17, 1861, he is considered one of Canada’s finest poets, particularly of nature verse. Like John Keats, who Lampman is often compared to, the latter died young: he passed away in Ottawa on February 10, 1899, at the age of 37 from complications due to heart disease and pneumonia. From 1883 until his death, Lampman worked as a post office clerk, a position he complained about but which afforded him a number of advantages. As his friend and fellow writer Duncan Campbell Scott observed, his poems “‘were principally composed as he walked … to and from his ordinary employment’ as well as on location in the countryside or pacing the…

They say (said Reginald) that there’s nothing sadder than victory except defeat. If you’ve ever stayed with dull people during what is alleged to be the festive season, you can probably revise that saying. I shall never forget putting in a Christmas at the Babwolds’. Mrs. Babwold is some relation of my father’s — a sort of to-be-left-till-called-for cousin — and that was considered sufficient reason for my having to accept her invitation at about the sixth time of asking; though why the sins of the father should be visited by the children — you won't find any notepaper in that drawer; that’s where I keep old menus and first-night programmes. Mrs. Babwold wears a rather solemn personality, and has never been known to smile, even when saying disagreeable things…

Yesterday I went for a walk in the woods. You have to be careful these days: there have been reports of a cougar seeking too much human company. One of the things I saw (but only later identified) was the skull of a coyote, buried lightly under the snow. My little dog was keen to dig the bones out of their shallow grave, but we moved on. We came next to the river, which I noticed was running especially fast and high. It’s far too early for the spring freshet, and a sign confirmed that this rushing is human made; water is being diverted to prevent overflow upstream, where aging dam gates are being replaced. Yet, the water was not so wild that we couldn’t descend the path and rest…

The wind has gently murmured through the blinds, or puffed with feathery softness against the windows, and occasionally sighed like a summer zephyr lifting the leaves along, the livelong night. The meadow-mouse has slept in his snug gallery in the sod, the owl has sat in a hollow tree in the depth of the swamp, the rabbit, the squirrel, and the fox have all been housed. The watch-dog has lain quiet on the hearth, and the cattle have stood silent in their stalls. The earth itself has slept, as it were its first, not its last sleep, save when some street-sign or wood-house door has faintly creaked upon its hinge, cheering forlorn nature at her midnight work,—the only sound awake twixt Venus and Mars,— advertising us of a remote inward…