You Call This Winter?
Take a hike in the wild during a Missouri winter,
and it’s a crapshoot. Bare branches heavy
with snow and turkey tracks the only impressions
in the white blanket that lies before you,
or t-shirt weather with the sound of rustling leaves
as you scuff them out of your way wondering
what happened to the four inches of snow
that shut things down just last week.
I may not miss the storms of New York’s winters,
but I sure miss the snow of New York’s winters,
where it knows how to fall and stick around
until it decides to fall again. And again.
Where the beauty of driving through a forest
with a blanket of snow can be appreciated
in spite of the inconvenience of slick roads
or the need to clear your windows of frost.
As much as I may appreciate warm spells
that are more frequent than cold, or the need
to shovel the driveway all of three times,
give me a New York winter, any time.
This is my response to the prompt Poetics: The Blizzard of the Self, from Sanaa at dVerse ~ Poets Pub, which is to speak to winter.
rivrvlogr 
It’s been the same here, blah, with no snow. We got 1 good snow so far. I hope winter as we remember it is not passed away.
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Even before I moved away from WNY, the winters had become milder than in my childhood. Back then, it may not have been “knee-deep, uphill both ways” but winters were more like winter.
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I’ve never experienced a New York winter, but you have brought it to me in this poem, Ken.
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Thank you, Kim. 🙂
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This is exquisitely drawn, Ken! You bring New York winter to us so aptly through your words! Here in my part of the world, winter is cold and freezing but without snow. Which makes me long to experience it one day! Thank you so much for writing to the prompt 💙💙
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And thank you, Sanaa! It’s much easier for me to miss the cold & snow now that I’m retired and not working in it every day.
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From the far wet west I salute your love of snow. 🙂
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Waving back!
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I know just what you mean. We’re getting this weird snow, rain, cold, warm winter. My husband and I drove up to our home town in northern Vermont, where it was COLD and the ground was covered with SNOW, the way January is supposed to be.
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Winter everywhere is changing.
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It’s very concerning.
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I think you have a “New York State of Mind!” Well done!
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I think I do! Thank you, Dwight.
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:>)
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Much less white stuff, this year but, man, it’s friggin cold. Or maybe it’s just me…
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I definitely don’t miss the cold, although winters back in WNY are nothing like they were when I was a kid.
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All these grey rainy days are no substitute. We used to have winter here in the city too…(K)
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The weather everywhere is changing.
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Well, Dwight just stole my comment so, I’ll just say: A nice one, Ken. :>)
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🙂 Thank you.
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I have never really moved but winter here has moved from the New York kind (which I like) to drizzle-grey melancholy
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Yet we still have climate change deniers.
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“I may not miss the storms of New York’s winters,
but I sure miss the snow of New York’s winters,”
Luv your appreciation of winter
Much❤love
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Thank you, Gilenna. 🙂
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You must be referring to New York, out in the country, because it’s so gross in the city!
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400 miles from NYC!
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Yeah, then I can definitely see the beauty! 🙂
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