Free Vintage Nature Poem: January by Mary Rowles Jarvis (Part 2)

Here is a winter poem, originally published in 1896, that depicts the month of January as a fierce warrior king whose strength is tempered with a kind heart.

"JANUARY"
by Mary Rowles Jarvis
(Part 2)

His rod of iron, outstretched upon the land,
Arrests the stir and music of the rills;
Again the rushing rains of his right hand
Lay bare the lasting hills.

Yet fear we not this warrior, fierce and bold,
The year has turned, the light shall lengthen soon;
The onslaught of his keen, relentless cold
Shall make straight paths for June.

His ways are stern, his meanings are benign;
Behold, unharmed, the snowdrop on his crest,
While the gold splendour of the celandine
Shines starlike on his breast!

You can find PART 1 here.

The painting above is called "Winter Landscape" by Ivan Fedorovich Choultsé (1874 – 1939). You can find the image of the original painting on Wikimedia here and my digitally enhanced version of the painting here.

If you would like to download the poem as it originally appeared in The Girl's Own Paper (as seen above) with its accompanying black and white illustration, you can find the high-res 9" x 8" @ 300 ppi JPEG here.


From my personal collection of ephemera. These images are to be incorporated into your creative endeavors and not for resale or re-distribution "as-is". Please credit FieldandGarden.com as your source when sharing or publishing.

Free Vintage Nature Poem: January by Mary Rowles Jarvis (Part 1)

Here is a winter poem, originally published in 1896, that depicts the month of January as a stern warrior king, bringing snow and ice in his wake as he rides through the fields.

"JANUARY"
by Mary Rowles Jarvis
(Part 1)

Victorious on the utmost crags of time,
From the dread conflict of the midnight sea,
The first-born month draws near with song and chime,
A monarch great and free!

In the red storm-light of the wintry dawn
We see him stand, austere and tempest-crowned,
With sword and spear on many an ice-field drawn
To work his will profound.

His chariot is the north wind that hath crossed,
By leagues of drift and berg, the Polar main;
His sandals are the ploughshares of the frost
That rend the clods in twain.

Continue to PART 2 here.

The painting above is called "Winter Morning in Engadine" by Ivan Fedorovich Choultsé (1874 – 1939). You can find the image of the original painting on Wikimedia here and my digitally enhanced version of the painting here.


From my personal collection of ephemera. These images are to be incorporated into your creative endeavors and not for resale or re-distribution "as-is". Please credit FieldandGarden.com as your source when sharing or publishing.

Vintage Art Appreciation: A Wooded Path in Autumn by H.A. Brendekilde

A Wooded Path in Autumn, 1902
by Hans Andersen Brendekilde (1857 – 1942)
You expected to be sad in the fall. Part of you died each year when the leaves fell from the trees and their branches were bare against the wind and the cold, wintery light. But you knew there would always be the spring, as you knew the river would flow again after it was frozen. When the cold rains kept on and killed the spring, it was as though a young person died for no reason.
― Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast

Autumn is the hardest season. The leaves are all falling, and they're falling like they're falling in love with the ground.
― Andrea Gibson

The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.
— Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

You will lose someone you can’t live without,and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.
— Anne Lamott

Vintage Art Appreciation: Souvenir of Acherese by Jean-Leon Gerome

Winter is an etching, spring a watercolor, summer an oil painting
and autumn a mosaic of them all.
― Stanley Horowitz
I originally found this fall landscape painting — Souvenir of Acherese, painted in 1903 by Jean-Leon Gerome (1824 – 1904) — on Wikimedia Commons, which I cropped and colour-enhanced. You can download a 7" x 5" @ 300 ppi JPEG of my digitally altered version without a watermark here. I thought it would make an attractive decoration for a scrapbooking project or a Thanksgiving card but you can also simply print and frame for wall art.


Digitally enhanced reproductions of public domain fine art are shared under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Vintage Art Appreciation: Spring in the Forest by George Edward Lodge

Spring in the Forest
by George Edward Lodge (1860 - 1954)
The beautiful spring came; and when Nature resumes her loveliness, the human soul is apt to revive also.
― Harriet Ann Jacobs

The forest was not dark, because darkness has nothing to do with the forest — the forest is made of life, of light — but the trees moved with wind and subtle creatures.
― Lauren Groff, The Midnight Zone

Old-growth forests met no needs. They simply were, in a way that bore no questions about purpose or value. They could not be created by men. They could not even be understood by men. They had too many parts that were interconnected in too many ways. Change one part and everything else would change, but in ways that were unpredictable and often inexplicable. This unpredictability removed such forests from the realm of human perspectives and values. The forest did not need to justify or explain itself. It existed outside of instrumental human considerations.
― Steve Olson

Vintage Art Appreciation: A Walk in the Woods by Louis-Robert Carrier-Belleuse

A Walk in the Woods, 1873
by Louis-Robert Carrier-Belleuse (4 July 1848 – 14 June 1913)

The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.
― John Muir

All forests have their own personality. I don't just mean the obvious differences, like how an English woodland is different from a Central American rain forest, or comparing tracts of West Coast redwoods to the saguaro forests of the American Southwest... they each have their own gossip, their own sound, their own rustling whispers and smells. A voice speaks up when you enter their acres that can't be mistaken for one you'd hear anyplace else, a voice true to those particular tress, individual rather than of their species.
― Charles de Lint, The Onion Girl

The forest has shrunk
And fear has expanded,
The forests have dwindled,
There are less animals now,
less courage and less lightning,
less beauty
and the moon lies bare,
deflowered by force and
then abandoned.
― Visar Zhiti, The Condemned Apple: Selected Poetry

In the beginning I gave you paper for books, fruits for food, roots, bark and leaves for medicine, and I gave you shelter from the scorching sun and fierce rainfall, but now you cut me down for parts and set me on fire without remorse.
― Paul Bamikole

Vintage Art Appreciation: A January Evening in the Haagse Bosch by Louis Apol

A January Evening in the Haagse Bosch, 1875
by Louis Apol (1850 - 1936)
Inhale and hold the evening in your lungs.
― Sebastian Faulks, Engleby

To find the universal elements enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter... to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's nest or a wildflower in spring - these are some of the rewards of the simple life.
― John Burroughs

I love to watch the fine mist of the night come on,
The windows and the stars illumined, one by one,
The rivers of dark smoke pour upward lazily,
And the moon rise and turn them silver. I shall see
The springs, the summers, and the autumns slowly pass;
And when old Winter puts his blank face to the glass,
I shall close all my shutters, pull the curtains tight,
And build me stately palaces by candlelight.
― Charles Baudelaire, Les Fleurs du Mal

Vintage Art Appreciation: A Winter Woodland by Karl Rosen

A Winter Woodland
by Karl Rosen (1864 - 1934)
The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.
― John Muir

The places of quiet are going away, the churches, the woods, the libraries. And it is only in silence we can hear the voice inside of us which gives us true peace.
― James Rozoff

Here is your country. Cherish these natural wonders, cherish the natural resources, cherish the history and romance as a sacred heritage, for your children and your children's children. Do not let selfish men or greedy interests skin your country of its beauty, its riches or its romance.
― Theodore Roosevelt

An English wood is like a good many other things in life-- very promising at a distance, but a hollow mockery when you get within. You see daylight on both sides, and the sun freckles the very bracken. Our woods need the night to make them seem what they ought to be--what they once were, before our ancestors' descendants demanded so much more money, in these so much more various days.
― Gertrude Atherton, The Bell in the Fog & Other Stories