Before a Forecast Storm

They plane in toward the wire and then are lost,
but as we pass, their chuckling voices comment
on our passing.

So far I have seen tomorrow
in only a flake or two.

At the field, blue tufts of fur on the frozen ground
suggest without sound a death
here or near here. He takes no notice:
even scent is silent.

In this waiting calm,
squirrels are ubiquitous.
The quiet draws them out
to run across their rooftops,
unregarded by the passing cars.

Upstanding limbs of trees are bare and still
to let the winter pass from cloud to ground.

Another tree speaks noisily
about sparrows it conceals
in green.

We walk uphill through light that makes us,
like the sky and yards and houses,
luminous.

Looking out of doors I see
it still has not begun.

February 10 2010