The day dawned quietly with first light caresssing the east with red glow.
Faint featherlike solar rays reached north and south,
Heavy darkness gave way to grey dawn, touched with pink trim.
Out of the deep came the arching sun.
Across the sky fragile white clouds slowly began their day dance.
The day brightened warm as southern air moved over valleys and hills.
Fall was sharing its last kiss of nature’s warm embrace.
By mid-morning one sensed a distant ominous motion to the northwest.
A low dark cloud spoke of a new front moving in.
Quickly the first winds of winter reached southward,
As what had been partly cloudy became all gray.
What had been warm, became cold gusts from the cloud.
The bright morning turned to threatening storm!
Sharp winds came on with steady pace!
And then the rain.
Gentle at first, like damp air at evening, then drizzle, then rain!
It seemed like only minutes as the front moved south and east
The first chill of winter’s blast swept the countryside!
As rain became heavy, pelting the fields, the trees, the houses,
The wind drove the rain, lightning flashed, thunder rolled.
The velosity of nature’s gale increased, shook houses, thrashed trees,
And then came icy cold, carried on wild squalls bent on destruction!
Rain was suddenly mixed with snow, torrents of snow!
Huge flakes wet and heavy, sticking to everything!
As the storm came on it became hard to breathe,
Hard to see, hard to walk!
The people drew coats about themselves,hurried to cars,
Rushed homeward!
The ground was quickly covered, the trees white, the wires heaping with snow!
The day turned dark, the storm perilous,
Streets emptied rapidly!
Crashing limbs brought a new alert.
The trees still green with leaves caught the snow,
Turned white, heavy with the plunging wet flakes,
Their limbs bent, broke, fell!
The crash of breaking limbs echoed in the wind!
Electric lines snapped and fell with tree limbs, arcing sparks,
Sizzling, burning, curling, whipping!
Lights went out; the people feared new dangers!
As the hours passed, noontime, then evening ,
The snow piled, clung, heavy, ever deeper!
A lonely chill settled on homes and businesses.
The unrelenting storm, the howling wind, kept coming, coming!
Hours crept by, towns and countryside huddled in disbelief.
Winter spending its fury too early, too fierce!
Through the night the storm raged!
The people waited, anxious, struggling to keep warm.
The morning broke, bringing a sudden halting of wind and snow.
A vast white winter landscape had been quickly born, fraught with dangers,
Power outages, perilous broken limbs and wires, blocked roads!
Cold homes, repair crews struggling through drifts, myriad emergencies!
Nature had spoken, in awe the world listened!
(1997)
(Written for the Park Centre newsletter)