late night drive home —

who will choose the songs

we sing along to?

she remembers

putting up the mailbox flag

meant something to share

front yard bunny

shows us where the front stoop

needs shoveling

he smiles, circling back

until we’ve all become

part of the chorus


(How you will be missed, Pete Seeger!)

admiring

dawn’s easy alchemy —

gold every time

after the storm

I can’t stop thinking about

what might have been saved

worn down by the day  —

even the moonlit snow

gets on my nerves

ice invisible

from every angle but one —

awaiting her answer

all laced up, but

the ice-calmed lake is still

not safe for skating

innumerable

branches now outlined in white

as if for counting

such sweet abandon…

letting go of plans and then

doing it again

winter layers —

appreciating the moon

behind clouds and trees

made bold by moonlight,

we sneak open the door

to watch his angel face

watching the stars

from the corner of her eye —

ambiguous kiss

absent memory —

the older sister explains

how it was again

during apartheid

we learned N’kosi Sikeleli —

I still sing it

underfoot

the hard wobble of acorns —

we all had first steps

the lake freezes

then thaws again —

do the fish notice?

no one can tell

which of these singing birds

was born just this spring

wordlessly watching

a dark swirl of birds

stir the morning fog

choked with ice

the river jumps its banks —

she calls me at work

the smell of snow

and the feel of chicken pox —

long ago winter

at day’s end

high above our cold-bowed heads

the moon no one saw

amber dusk —

he turns his hearing aid off

to watch the sun slide

the last storm came for

trees that were ready to go —

save math for morning

how we will hold on

to any story that feels

like ours

under a snow drift,

their colors forgotten —

front yard azaleas

after the snowstorm

birds and trees showing through —

just the one canvas

imagining

small birds for whom tonight’s snow

is the first ever

singing to himself,

our boy sets something right

in the rest of us