A couple spends Christmas at a crowded country house, stuck in a cramped attic. The speaker, estranged from his wife, hears the party’s midnight carouse but feels only an abyss when he approaches her door. He lies on the floor, tormented by shame, pride, and pain — foul demons he begs to chain up. Outside, the cold is brutal: freezing darkness, lambs bleating, a bird stiffening under starlight. But in his sleep, a banished angel slips to his side and holds his feet to her breasts all night. The dream merges maternal nurture with something more sensual, and the contrast between the icy waking world and this secret, body-warm vision makes the poem’s loneliness even sharper.
Modern Love XXIII: 'Tis Christmas Weather — Summary
'Tis Christmas weather, and a country house Receives us: rooms are full: we can but get An attic-crib. Such lovers will not fret At that, it is half-said. The great carouse Knocks hard upon the midnight's hollow door, But when I knock at hers, I see the pit. Why did I come here in that dullard fit? I enter, and lie couched upon the floor. Passing, I caught the coverlet's quick beat:-- Come, Shame, burn to my soul! and Pride, and Pain-- Foul demons that have tortured me, enchain! Out in the freezing darkness the lambs bleat. The small bird stiffens in the low starlight. I know not how, but shuddering as I slept, I dreamed a banished angel to me crept: My feet were nourished on her breasts all night.