After Snow
I’m the first car after the sander.
In my headlights, the cinnamon swirls
of fresh sand are intact.
What dial did I turn to get here,
the road a bolt of cloth
unfurling before me, and on all sides
the windless, snow-softened pines?
A rift opened in the world,
and guess what was on the other side?
The world. That’s tonight’s poem:
nothing but a small sudden
understanding. Nothing permanent.
More from Chase Twichell
“Invisible Fence”
“Fox Bones”
“Ochre and Blue”
“Second Innocence: With Basho at Sesshin”
“The Ghost of Eden: Zen and Poetry”
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