… How her lit crowding fairylands sink through the space-silence
To build her palace, till it twinkles in starlight —
Too frail for a foot
Or a crumb of soot.

Then how his muffled armies move in all night
And we wake and every road is blockaded
Every hill taken and every farm occupied
And the white glare of his tents is on the ceiling.
And all that dull blue day and on into the gloaming
We have to watch more coming.

Then everything in the rubbish-heaped world
Is a bridesmaid at her miracle.
Dunghills and crumbly dark old barns are bowed in the chapel of her sparkle.
The gruesome boggy cellars of the wood
Are a wedding of lace
Now taking place.

************************************

This is the end of Snow and Snow by Ted Hughes.

It’s true that all this snow, falling and falling, makes the world a wedding.

The world I’m looking at from my front windows doesn’t have dunghills. Take away the lace and it’s evergreen, or azalea.

***************************************

Snowed in, we watch things.  Snow builds itself up
into slim hills along our split rail fence and inches up
into cone hats in our flower pots. Ania took this picture
as the dog walked in front of the camera.

This morning the street was absolutely silent.  White,
empty, silent.

*************************************

Gradually people on skis and sleds and people walking dogs who were dressed in winter jackets began to appear.  The town truck pressed its plow against Rokeby Avenue.

While Mr UD shoveled a path from the front door to the car,  I went to the stack of twigs and logs I keep on the deck, and brought bits of it in for a fire. I tossed a twig to the dog.

It’s five o’clock now, and the world’s become gray and blue as well as white. Up and down the street, holiday lights flash a little gold against the snow. People have gone back inside their houses.