Quan Yin and poem

Lowland Snow

Dressing bare branches in winter white lace,

fat snowflakes drift silent instead of customary

pounding rains smacking earth’s surfaces.

Today’s snow wanders from soiled gray clouds

muting winter’s normal hissing clatter.

Cars and buses splatter damp world puddles;

studded tires rip across frozen watery asphalt.

Speeding past winter wonderland of inconvenience,

Monday’s surprise not deep enough to cancel

school, slow down rushing employees late for work,

or for short wild critters, cats and dogs to snorkel through.

Slipping from branch and blade as air warms, fluffy layer

disappears almost as fast as a shooting star leaving

a trail of wishes vanishing from ether into damp soil…

1/10/2011