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Swan in Falling Snow, December 1984

Swan in Falling Snow

Upon the darkish, thin, half-broken ice
there seemed to lie a barrel-sized, heart-shaped snowball,
frozen hard, its white
identical with the untrodden white
of the lake shore. Closer, its somber face-
mask and beak-came clear, the neck’s
long cylinder, and the splayed feet, balanced,
weary, immobile. Black water traced, behind it,
an abandoned gesture. Soft
in still air, snowflakes
fell and fell. Silence
deepened, deepened. The short day
suspended itself, endless.

~ Poem by Denise Levertov