Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Posts Tagged ‘shoveling’

One with a Cup of Coffee

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on March 10, 2019| 2 Comments »

 

 

 

letting the sun

shovel the drive—

the morning and I supervise

Read Full Post »

Awake at Midnight

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on February 20, 2019| Leave a Comment »

 

 

 

The snow was light and the moon was near full,

and the shovels skated across the drive.

 

The rest of the world was asleep

except for the shoveler and her shovels and the moon.

 

The snow was light and her thoughts were quiet,

quiet like leafless cottonwood trees

 

with branches that tangled with the forward moon.

There are nights when though we are alone

 

we are not alone,

nights when the darkness doesn’t seem so dark,

 

nights when our work feels not like work

and we step out of our homes, then out of ourselves,

 

and we are somehow unsurprised

by the way everything shines.

Read Full Post »

How to Unshovel the Snow: An Evening Conundrum

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on December 27, 2018| 6 Comments »

 

 

 

It’s not so much that you want the snow

back in the drive, it’s just that your back

felt so much better before the shoveling,

 

and so, using your sideways logic, you think

to yourself that if the snow were unshoveled

your back might unhurt. And while

 

you’re at it, you think you might unthink

those thoughts you thought the night before

shoveling the drive. Though they didn’t

 

amount to any action, now that you’ve

thought them they’ve become a frame

that’s changed everything. So you start

 

with the snow, because revising that seems easier

than anything else, but to shovel it back

in the drive would seem to exacerbate

 

the problem with the back, so

you consider ways the snow might unfall,

all of them fanciful. At least for a while,

 

it amuses you, the idea of ten million

million snowflakes rising, but then

the reality of drought returns and you

 

feel guilty for unwishing the snow. No,

better to put your hope in perseverance,

better to put your hope in healing.

 

It happens. And you walk up the drive,

so snowless and clear you can safely look up

at the sky and see all those stars. The snow

 

gathers whatever light there is. It can’t

unshine. You thrill a bit in the chill. Some

of the shine reaches into you. Some of it stays.

 

 

Read Full Post »

One in the Snow

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on March 4, 2018| Leave a Comment »

 

 

 

dancing with the shovel

for an hour on the drive,

everywhere we go, a path

Read Full Post »

The Need for Absence

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on January 7, 2018| 4 Comments »

 

 

For an hour and a half, my son and I

create emptiness. All those places

where there was snow

on the drive and the walk,

we shovel them until there’s a long,

sinewy swath of absence.

It is deeply satisfying,

this moving of matter

from one place to another,

creating a path, a way.

When we are done, we lean

on our shovels and revel

in what is missing. We high five

and smile and feel as if we’ve really

accomplished something together.

How oddly full I feel

after this effort of emptying.

How many paths in me

are waiting to be exposed?

Read Full Post »

haiku

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on December 25, 2011| 1 Comment »

yesterday
deep snow
today we shovel light

Read Full Post »

What’s in a Dream?

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on December 4, 2011| 3 Comments »

Most people have had not honored even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made.
—Bronnie Ware, Top Five Regrets of the Dying

Three inches of chicken feathers
fell overnight, and my son,
still dressed in blue striped pajamas,

went scampering out
to move snow. We moved
snow for an hour. Two hours?

We moved snow from one place
to another. We moved snow
and moved more snow.

Whose dream is that?
To move snow? But between
the stripes of asphalt and white

the morning filled in
with the richest laughter.
No reason to laugh except

we were shoveling and the snow
was light and the sky was gray
and it looked, hallelujah,

as if it might snow some more
so that we could keep moving
together outside, warm

and breathless and choosing
to shovel, to move piles of snow
joyfully from one place to another.

Read Full Post »

%d bloggers like this: