I stop, winded, the air sifting down.
Here is the peculiar light I hoped for.
The branches of the pines are lobed with snow,
each shape intact, and brightened from within.
I walked among these flickering trunks in fall,
the grass grown stiff and noisy underfoot,
and found a mystery, a tree, a flowering quince,
all pale and fragrant, out of season.
It gave off this light.
What is holy is earth's unearthliness.
Love, could we describe it,
would break apart, lucency and force.
A starling rasps from his white precinct.
Far back in the woods, the snow is falling again,
perhaps into your life. The wind returns
to chisel its drifts and ribbing.
Forgive the rounded burdens of the branches.
They do not suffer, suffused in this light.
They are not sorrows,
though that is the meaning we give them.
A little unseasonal but thoughtful and moving, from her collection Horses Where the Answers Should Have Been quoted on Carol Peter's poetry blog which is well worth a visit. (I've quoted Twichell's poetry before on this blog go and read some!)
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