We Were Angels

First snows, like apple trees 

blooming all at once, must be tasted, sipped even, and swirled. 

Hurried flakes denature on our tongues and 

you glance to the girl at your side. I am

a summer aspen leaf trembling– you think shivering.

Main Street murmurs a Christmas carol, its tune 

too simple to remember or forget. Nothing is thought of to say,

so the stillness remains untouched.

We ski through a forest whiter than teeth,

sucking on balls of cold and nose-breathing the spotless air,

trilling minds faceted in a million directions–

gods for a fraction of time, just like

silver tree branches and that lamppost.

The snowfall promises a cold, precipitous winter

If anything can stop the melting it is white

reflections of the sun. Let us be blind.

He calls too late on a school night asking about a walk.

I am too tired, the fire too warm, everything too far away.

Tomorrow, I say, knowing tomorrow is rain. 

I stand alone outside, dwarfed in Dad’s raincoat, letting

snowflakes collapse onto my shoulders. Everything glows

and whiteness collects on my toes like blossoms,

healing me from the outside in.

I am a girl, a woman, and a mountain.