Dawn. In the dim light, a pitter-patter of freezing rain slowly turns into the dry whisper of sleet, then the hush of snow — and back again.
snow
January 23, 2021
The one-time slush pile in the yard looks hard as a wind-dried bone. The tall pines sigh in their sleep. I begin to lose feeling in my toes.
January 22, 2021
Half an hour before sunrise, the first inquisitive chirps: mockingbird. A snow-free caesura in the road where the spring flows under it.
January 21, 2021
The first stripe of sunlight to make it through the woods follows the 200-year-old colliers’ trail. In thin snow, the cuneiform of sparrows.
January 18, 2021
A few minutes till sunrise; the wren sounds impatient. But the clouds are heavy—overflowing, in fact. It’s light enough now to see the flakes.
January 16, 2021
Rising late, I catch the last of some new-snow magic dripping from the eaves. Friends arrive bearing sauerkraut.
January 9, 2021
Clear and still. The tree’s long shadows stripe the white hillside like a zebra. Below the porch, a cat’s footprints.
January 4, 2021
Yesterday evening’s new-snow magic has completely dissipated, replaced by the familiar bleakness and a drip drip drip on the porch roof.
January 2, 2021
A pause in the rain. My snow-plowed mound has turned to slush, which makes an interesting feature for a writer’s front yard: a literal slush pile.
December 24, 2020
White sky and white ground meet in a blur of fog. Above the drumming of rain on the roof, a white-throated sparrow’s minor-key song.
December 22, 2020
After a night of light rain, the snowpack has shrunk, revealing a microtopography of logs, pits and mounds—bones under the skin of an elder.
December 20, 2020
It’s snowing. A squirrel carrying a walnut leaps from limb to limb, trailed by a cascade of powder, and disappears into a hollow oak.
December 18, 2020
Overcast and cold. Juncos hop down the snowy streambanks for a drink. A female cardinal flies past—the extra red in her open wings.
December 17, 2020
Cold and still at sunrise. With more than a foot of new-fallen snow, the woods’ edge is an asemic text already being edited by squirrels.