A Mind of Winter

One must have a mind of winter

To regard the frost and the boughs

Of the pine trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time

To behold the junipers shagged with ice,

The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think

Of any misery in the sound of the wind,

In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land

Full of the same wind

That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,

And, nothing himself, beholds

Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

("The Snow Man" by Wallace Stevens)

This is winter. We walked out the other day, in boots and warm jackets with the hoods over our heads and cozy gloves on our hands. The air was still and cold. It has been so cold that the snow has not started falling from the trees, and every tree is robed in white. It is quiet. We hear our footsteps crunching in the snow and snowflakes landing on our hoods. We see deer tracks in the snow. When the sun shines, the snow glitters like a thousand flakes of broken glass. This is winter.