No leaves on the trees
beside the ditch,
and the first snow
outlines in white what remains
in their absence.
What remains is
the dark gesture of tree,
thrust and jut and extend.
Just this morning,
Meredith taught me
to see the movement
in what appears to be still—
even a brown jar,
she says, suggests twist
and elongate and turn.
I wonder if I could be still
like that, still enough
that the snow might settle
on me, though I’m reach
and wrestle and brawl.
This is our practice,
to move at the same time
toward quietude, toward swirl;
to be the scaffolding that holds up
the miracle; to be shine and rise and fall.
