I remember as a young lad, my cousin Glenn and I walked several miles to a public sale. It was a bitter cold day in March, with a strong Norhtwest wind. My face literally hurt by the time we got back home. I had never experienced cold that was so painful. To this day I find cold winds very hard to deal with. (Perhaps that's why I like to escape to the balmy temperatures of Venice, FL each winter.)

Whenever a winter wind is blowing, my mind goes back to the poem "Ode to the West Wind" by Percy Bysshe Shelley. It sort of puts the bitter experience of the coming winter in some perspective. Let me quote the last few verses of the poem. They go like this:

An Ill Wind

Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies

Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!

Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
Like wither'd leaves to quicken a new birth!
And, by the incantation of this verse,

Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth

The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

The soul of America is now in the midst of its own dark winter. A bitter wind has blown in from the nether world of those bent on destroying our western civilization. It just keeps blowing and blowing. There seems to be no end in sight. Yet as we look back over history, all the dark winters have eventually come to an end. This one will too, if we but keep the faith. Perhaps one balm can be found by looking again to the poet for words of wisdom; heart-warming words for these cold, dark days. "O Wind, if Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?"