down it comes

*
Down it
comes, large flakes,☼
building drifts, the best
part, * the wind blowing
“snow snakes”, across
the street and school playground,
just۞as I remember it always
was. Amid the bustle of early-winter chores.
we’ve watched۝ this snow piling up
for hours. The snow and these thoughts remind us:
autumn has departed. The newly-arrived۩ guest,
winter, seeks how to make her presence known.
Where did ۞you grow up? What was it
like, when you were a child at this time of year?
Did you wait in hiding for Santa and build snow forts in the yard? Or, are cookies
what you remember۝ most? Memories seem solidly strong,
but they can slip away, like those snow drifts, with the wind. What could be
more substantial? Our wish for you involves many ۩ seemingly insubstantial things
that the world at large may judge as lacking, next to material wealth, or the strength of armies.
Among these things, count truth as well as friendship, honor۞, and honest work;
and count ¤the last thing anyone might have expected to
have lasting ۝power: the Christmas message of love and light and grace.
You are the only one who can see the light in your own life. But those
who know
you well
can remind
you that
it is there,
and that
it does not
go out.



Wm. P. Mueller; 2007