13 Ways of Looking at Snow

1.
An observation is a near as one gets
to the basic crunch of snow,
never being inside to feel its pack,
the brittle wetness as a trillion particles
compact into a trillion more.

2.
The distances we feel-- we know,
are cosmoses compared to space--
interposed between the snow.

3.

What keeps one in a body?

From floating away

with the brazen chill of wind

and the nighest bank of snow

brushing beneath our boots?

4.
I might've been a flake,
I might've touched the wind,
I might've, but I'm not.

5.
Between bare ground
and viscous air,
it's all there, growing whiter
and wider and without
a lake and forest to divide it,
I might not see past the snow.

6.
Watching a lake freeze
becomes a contemplative
act of expression, a burial,
when the Sun has almost set.

7.
Her cruelest moments were like
snow in the Arctic:
hard-packed and plenteous.

8.
I would rather melt
than have to cross another
desert of snow, omitted from her sight.

9.
Its purity cakes everything;
her pervasive whiteness,
the near-perfect white
only a reflection of the Sun.

10.
It's blank.

11.
My eyes are black in the center,
white along the rim,
with blue in between,
like sooted snow, fresh snow, glacial snow.

12.
Had it been colder that day,
the rain would've been snow,
and she just might've returned that call.

13.
It's getting desperate as
the crystals and connections
get warmer and our bonds
get looser and looser and
poof!
What once was
a vital gliding sliver,
is reduced to a drop
in a pool.

The Bounty

Antoine etched “Federico Muñoz,”

being the original name, as well as “My

Closest Friend in ____” without further syntax,

demonstrating his obduracy anew,

echoing losing feelings from Kiev,

Forgetting those made in Peru.

Gruffly he clutched the carved mast,

holding it between his remaining fingers,

index and left ring lost to a gator—

(Jambalaya Swamps)—and a thumb in Iraq

(knocking about drunk, caught looting a shop).

Lately and again Antoine pined for his hermano

Muñoz, they had parted ways in Tehran,

never really saying goodbye, keeping mum

outwardly, but feeling an anxious, departing pull.

Pirates are no cordial cabin mates, but some mark

quietly their compadres íntimos, as when the Raj

ransomed himself, the two happily sharing his Hindi

Sword, and Muñoz had stolen the wrap of a Sikh;

They marveled then, at each other, at their roguish plundering.

Ultimately, Muñoz converted after too many puffs of keif,

Virtue swept him up, and he left the high sea's life.

With his wealth given all as alms and a new found

Xenophilic religiosity, now called Al-Mu'iz among Islamic

Youths, he abandoned cohort Antoine Ahab,

Zero attempts to contact his mate, instead bowing daily toward Mecca.

This is a double abecedarian--26 lines, A-Z first letter of each line, Z-A for the last.

In Pours the Snow

It pours from clouds, my eyes and temples glaze.
The wind a swell of snow that coats my face,
a logic rife with cold, indifferent,

unfrozen, melting water dripping down.

A rill that wets my lips and chin to fuel

responses, feeding freshly breathing thoughts,

as crowded round my Basin they appear -

to rust its iron-rimmed foundation.

My fervor wrapped in frozen sweat, a warmth

derived from rocky till.  The gravel laid

beneath my feet, ground's counterpoint to snow;

Its endless lack of heat, desire.  The rill

of moisture meets my neck, I shiver,

but smile, hollow space's intercessor.

Psychonautics VI

Let your mind be the epicenter--
a relief of compounded stress
radiating from your consciousness
through the tension of your body.

Relax in the chaos of the quake--
let your psyche be rocked and
feel the dense tautness ebb
out of your limbs and body.

Don't panic, or fight the waves--
they are a release from a reality
that has built up strain within,
just relax and let your psyche rock.

If you feel disoriented, you should--
Remember that you're still in your body.
Never fear your own mind's power
as it coalesces with the Earth's.

These Earthtrips are intense--
they'll transform your anthroform Richter,
but keep in mind they are essential
in avoiding a cataclysmic rifting.

Psychonautics V

Every trip is a gift,
a little dialogue with God,
and you never seem to remember
to ask the questions you'd planned to.
The voice of the universe
cannot help but to drown you out,
nevertheless,
you'll hear something to ponder.