Michael J. Carter
SNOW GLOBES: WINTER MINIATURES
1)
Ice stitched to the window,
embroidered kimono
held up to the light,
white world in a light world:
fern fronds, fanned feathers,
wheat stalks wheeling
their sharp edges knifing seams
in scattered needle-
points. The air’s crisp as a
fresh apple. An arctic chill’s
slid over the valley and
it’ll take the gloved hand
of God to change it.
2)
Like sheets on a line smoke ghosts twist:
They’re erased as they escape from every chimney. Trial
by fire followed by a trial of wind & cold. Colder.
Coldest winter in decades. When my apartment burned
down it was wintry like this but still, no wind. New puppy
in my arms. But that was a long time ago. In front
of me now new dog, snow banks and more solitude
than I can swallow oodles and piles of it
drifted high as yesterday’s blizzard.
3)
Swirl and pirouette, shimmer: snow curtains
the window, portraits in each pane frames
the ever-changing world. Last night, I drove home right
into the forehead of the storm: windshield shattering
chrysanthemums, dahlias slotting petals split
by the wind’s dull blade in headlight spangle: white
and lively and dangerous. What a way to go. The car
in front of me predatory with taillight’s red eyes.
My father taught me to drive slowly and never stop
in a snow storm, ease up to a corner and go right on through.
IN THE GARDEN
I’m up to my ankles in it—
confluence of grief and beauty where yesterday
the morning glory spun out what looks like its
last flame-blue blossom. None today.
Poppies. Clematis. What will become of us? Cosmos
float on their spindly stalks, sparkling stars, dew
bejewels every surface, wet grass sticks to my bare feet.
What use is beauty? It is your perception of it.
Like beauty itself. I’m blurry with sleep,
yesterday’s morning glory blurred now in the afternoon’s
heat: a melted candle or crayon. John’s skin was
waxy in his coffin. Like beauty itself. But what’s
the use? At least the flowers are real, and they’ve
dressed the body within an inch of its life.