Vernon Scannell
Snow Joke
Some time after midnight it began,
the secretive and silent transformation
of April’s variegated score to one
cold and monochrome asseveration
that winter had not yet been overcome.
Next morning’s curtains parted to reveal
the street and all its furnishings become,
in their white trance, intransigently still,
each motor car a furry animal,
stunned in hibernation; nameless, dumb.
By nine o'clock no sun to modify
this black and white account of spring’s defeat;
the trees in Wharfdale Park were hung with white,
but this was not the metaphoric snow
that Alfred Edward Housman wrote about.
My dog and I walked over fields that spread
before us like white parchment; feet and paws
inscribed a timeless message with their tread.
I hailed a fellow-walker, asked his views:
‘Snow joke!’ he called. Or so I thought he said.
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