Friday, December 26, 2008

POETRY FRIDAY: Snow by Naomi Shihab Nye



In the last two weeks, we have had our share of ice and snowstorms here in the Northeast. We definitely had a white Christmas this year in Massachusetts. I went looking for a poem about winter or snow to post this Friday and found the following poem entitled Snow, which was written by Naomi Shihab Nye. It blew me away...like a blizzardy blast of frigid air. Nye is one of my favorite poets. I wish I could do what she does with words and meaning and metaphor.


From Snow
By Naomi Shihab Nye

Once with my scarf knotted over my mouth
I lumbered into a storm of snow up the long hill
and did not know where I was going except to the top of it.
In those days we went out like that.
Even children went out like that.
Someone was crying hard at home again,
raging blizzard of sobs.

I dragged the sled by its rope,
which we normally did not do
when snow was coming down so hard,
pulling my brother whom I called by our secret name
as if we could be other people under the skin.
The snow bit into my face, prickling the rim
of the head where the hair starts coming out.
And it was a big one. It would come down and down
for days. People would dig their cars out like potatoes.


You can read the rest of the poem here


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At Wild Rose Reader, I have an original rhyming acrostic poem entitled Chameleon.

Tricia has the Poetry Friday Roundup at the Miss Rumphius Effect.



4 comments:

Mary Lee said...

Wow. Snow as the silences between human beings or as blank paper: drifting accumulations. Going sledding against all odds before the weather changes. That Naomi Shihab Nye. Wow.

Elaine Magliaro said...

Mary Lee,

Wow. That's what I thought, too, as I read through Nye's poem.

Jules at 7-Imp said...

Oh heavens, that is beautiful. And it was new to me. Thank you.

Elaine Magliaro said...

Jules,

I had never read that poem by Nye before either.