Another day, another snow: fat flakes coming down just thickly enough to be mesmerizing, turning the ground blank again. A gun goes off.
snowflakes
Snow on the ground and in the air. When the wind eddies around to the east, a great flock of shriveled leaves lifts off from the lilac.
Flakes in the air. The lilac leaves hold on, faded and stiff. And with my brown clothes and dark red hat, I suddenly realize I match the oaks.
A blank gray sky, this time of year, is the easiest kind to read: snow, it says, in a slowly accelerating tumble of pure punctuation.
Large, compound snowflakes drifting this way and that. A titmouse suddenly begins darting after them, hovering and diving like a flycatcher.
The advanced scouts for a promised snowstorm. A squirrel gallops across the porch roof and back, sounding like a very small, unshod horse.
Another bitter cold morning. A few snowflakes wander back and forth as if lost. The resident naturalist picks her way down the icy trail.
A bitter wind salted with snow. I spot an orange ornament on a lilac branch: a jelly ear fungus, too pretty to eat, sporting a tiny icicle.
It’s snowing: fine flakes wet enough to cling to the smallest twigs and give each bergamot stalk a tall white hat. Juncos twitter hosannas.
Bright sun, icy breeze. A few flakes zoom past. The only cloud is tiny and dissolves as I watch, leaving the sky to the fourth-quarter moon.
Cold with no wind; the few, small snowflakes float almost straight down. In the almost sunshine, a lone crow is trying to stir things up.
Gray snow clouds with a brief peephole for the sun. As flakes swirl down, snowbirds swirl up into the trees, egged on by a Carolina wren.
Still below freezing by late morning. Snowflakes wander back and forth among the new leaves. Holes in the clouds open and close.
Leap day. The sun comes out while snowflakes still circle the house. Around the old ruin of a dog statue, daffodils’ green fingertips.