Shake the Snow

Ten feet of snow, and it refused to stop.
Our hands could have been ice,
So cold.

Did you bring a jacket?

The farmers told us how to get there.
Our place in the middle of somewhere,
white like an unchartered canvas
three days waiting to be painted

Do you remember what you drew that day?

I slept through--
the deck, the roof, our car, the garden was littered-
plastered with Mother Nature's icy excess

Why didn't you wake me so we could both remember?

You sat in a grandpa's chair by the window,
with your pad and stencil. You never showed me
the invisible faces the storm brought form
with expressions that only time did show.

I knew they must have had sad faces--what did they say?

I woke up under the heavy winter quilt,
my skin itching with a wooly rash
engulfed by the world made crystal clear, you'd later say
I was in love with the tranquility and quiet of it all.

You must have been screaming inside?

I reached for you but you were over
there by the window, closest to the whole new world
Counting down the minutes until you grabbed your
traveling pants, coat and scarf. extra socks.

Why didn't you at least say good morning?

I rubbed my eyes, was scared by the placid look in your eyes
turned towards the white that made my toes numb;
like a colony ant, I crept back to the center
underneath the blanket that gave.

Inside I lay. Where did you go outside?
Were you afraid you'd get lost?

Wrapping myself in a cocoon,
I pried myself from the web of the bed and peered out at you,
near time's great center fold
A bitternut hickory--tall and foreboding was the God of the forest,
Its limbs heavy with secrets and sadness,

I watched you shake us off
the snow in the branches rained like hail
all over your face, your hands our past.

You let it hit; I watched as you grimaced in pain.
With a couple of shakes, you took down, two years of

Snow.

A child of Alabama, giddy with glee
Ventured out from the cupboard that smelled like death for a couple of hours
Into the last day of snow and before I could see the ground.