A speaker steps out into a frozen landscape and simply keeps walking. The poem moves in small, quiet snapshots: trees coated in ice, snow piling up under boots, a jacket slowly gathering a thin crust of frost. Even the speaker's "rolling gait" suggests a slow, steady, slightly heavy way of moving through the snow.
The second stanza marks a clear break. The "world of warmth" is left "at my back," and the speaker doesn't look behind. Walking for miles, they finally look up to find a leaden gray sky and no birdsong. Everything is hushed.
The mood is calm, but not cozy. The cold and the silence are a little bleak, yet the speaker seems at ease with them. The final line, "A peaceful time for a winter walk," states that feeling outright. Peace here comes from solitude and stillness, from being alone in a world that has gone quiet.