First Snow

After, there is a crystal stillness,
like in a dream seconds before it shatters
into waking light. Nothing moves.
Silence radiates up from hidden streets
broken only by the crack of limbs
beneath the heft of new snow.

Come morning the big plows
will raze this shimmering tableau
and everything will begin again.
For now, we watch from darkened windows,
unable to make a sound, to even breathe,
in fear of what small ruin we might bring.

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Chad Abushanab

Chad Abushanab is the author of The Last Visit, which won the 2018 Donald Justice Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Sewanee Review, Ecotone, The Believer, Best New Poets, Southern Poetry Review, and many other publications. He is an Assistant Professor of English at Bemidji State University located in the Northwoods of Minnesota. Read more at www.chadabushanab.com.

Also by Chad Abushanab (see all)

• First Snow - March 2, 2023
• Missing - October 10, 2018
• The Dive - October 10, 2018

Author: Chad Abushanab

Chad Abushanab is the author of The Last Visit, which won the 2018 Donald Justice Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Sewanee Review, Ecotone, The Believer, Best New Poets, Southern Poetry Review, and many other publications. He is an Assistant Professor of English at Bemidji State University located in the Northwoods of Minnesota. Read more at www.chadabushanab.com. View all posts by Chad Abushanab