THE SN.OW .
Snow· is.in the
oak.
Behind the thick, whitening
air which the wind drives,
the sun protrudes.
It presses the snow
on my pane of glass.
I remember snows and my walking
through their first fall in cities,
asleep or drunk
with the slow, desperate falling.
The snow blurs in my eyes
with other snows.
Snow is what must
come down, even if it struggles
to stay in the
air
with the strength
of the wind. Like an old man,
whatever I touch I tum
to the story of death.
Snow
is
what fills
the oak, and what covers
the grass and the bare garden.
Snow is what reverses
sidewalk, house and lawn
into the substance of whiteness.
So the watcher sleeps himself
back to the baby's eyes.
The tree, the breast, and the floor
are limbs of him, and from
