A rare snow day yesterday, the first since we moved here five years ago, and the woods were as beautiful as I'd imagined them to be.
It sifts from leaden sieves, It powders all the wood, It fills with alabaster wool The wrinkles of the road.
-Emily Dickinson
A winter garden in an alder swamp, Where conies now come out to sun and romp, As near a paradise as it can be And not melt snow or start a dormant tree.
-Robert Frost
Thus having prepared their buds
against a sure winter
the wise trees
stand sleeping in the cold.
-William Carlos Williams
It lifts existence on a plane of snow One level higher than the earth below, One level nearer heaven overhead, And last year's berries shining scarlet red.
-Robert Frost
In winter
all the singing is in
the tops of the trees
where the wind-bird
with its white eyes
shoves and pushes
among the branches.
-Mary Oliver
Here, where the world is quiet;
Here, where all trouble seems
Dead winds' and spent waves' riot
In doubtful dreams of dreams;
-Algernon Charles Swinburne
All in all, we got less than two inches, and it lasted less than a day before melting away. But for a few precious hours, between dawn and noon, our little corner of the world was hushed and winter white. In this dark world of ours true joy is often hard come by, but it was here, yesterday. For a little while.