Sunday, December 23, 2018

When I Looked Up by Sharon Irvine

A lovely poem for Christmas...

The scene belonged in a Lampman poem:
unfocused lavender hills,
the lake, silvered by winter vapour.
a sill white disc,
the reassuring crunch of snow under my boot.

Cedar lace against the dazzle of snow;
the branch broke in my hand,
the pungent odour of northern bush released
a slipstream of memory: canoes, the quavering solo of the loon,
snapping red pine fires, the endless light show against black velvet,
the rough touch of spruce, the silky fragility of birch.
And always the rocks, unyielding permanence,
finding us,
in place, in memory.

When I looked up,
each branch of the birch was etched against the sky;
along each branch, a ghostly shadow
of infinitely delicate snow feathers
like arrows in a quiver.

Over all, the benediction of stillness.

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