The speaker is in Italy, surrounded by the beauty of Florence, Venice, and Rome, but his mind keeps drifting back to a woman in a cold Canadian lakeside town. He imagines her watching the snow while he sits among warm olive trees, yet he is the one who feels left in darkness: “She has the sun-filled day ... I but the night!” In Venice, a solitary red-haired woman with dark, unseeing eyes seems to mirror his own loneliness amid the lively square. By the final section, he is grasping at small pleasures—almond blossoms, old ruins, moonlight, poems—to occupy himself. The mood is wistful, elegant, and quietly heartbroken: beauty offers comfort, but only a cold one.
Cold Tragedy — Summary
FLORENCE
How this old terrace of mellow, creamy stone Grows warm in this noontide sun of Italy ... I sit alone And dream a piteous dream of ecstasy And suddenly wake! In that raw town by a Canadian lake Does she pause now ... to watch the falling snow? Before me stretch the olive trees that glow With their soft silvery radiance; far below The towers of Florence rise, like tall carved flowers. Ah I know well she does not count her hours That swiftly pass from dawn to candle-light ... She has the sun-filled day ... I but the night!
VENICE
Dense violet sky of sparkling stars above, And all around The soft, mysterious stirring of dark velvet water That makes no sound. And here in the old Square Life ... surging, swaying, sparkling everywhere, As if it held at arms’ length waiting there The sky and water and their mysteries. But near me at a little table alone, A red-haired, black-eyed woman broods and waits, Gazing across the empty cups and plates. Her bright hair makes a glory in the light, But her dark eyes, unseeing, bring the night, Too near!
ROME
So ... only the little things are left to me ... Cold comforts they!... Beauty my only home. Drifting of almond bloom ... gray ruins of Rome ... The Italian sun that makes these old stones warm ... Lilt of old poems ... sight of a girlish form ... Gay little laughter ... moon through the cypress trees ... I occupy myself quite well with these.