What Is

Fresh snowfall looks diamond-hard,
but it is not.
My front yard now is a wilderness of blank,
but it is not
while the black crow in the snow-paled tree
saws silence with its caw.

Shaking snow from my hat, I recall
that as heat descends from the rising sun,
one by one
singular flakes
melt to feed spring,
becoming the water
they are.

The wrinkles in my face and the aching
in my arms warn that I am old,
but I am not.
I am still
the elemental being
crawling across
the kitchen floor,
clanging pots
and clashing pans
massacring quiet,
a new annunciation:

I am here!

the same being
hearing the ring
of single words
striking cold
white pages

like an Angel Gabriel
spreading his enormous wings
in a clap of thundersnow,
tending to
the solemnity of gist:

Behold!

-Kitty Yanson