Snow Day

Snow Day

BY BILLY COLLINSToday we woke up to a revolution of snow, its white flag waving over everything, the landscape vanished, not a single mouse to punctuate the blankness, and beyond these windows

the government buildings smothered, schools and libraries buried, the post office lost under the noiseless drift, the paths of trains softly blocked, the world fallen under this falling.

In a while, I will put on some boots and step out like someone walking in water, and the dog will porpoise through the drifts, and I will shake a laden branch sending a cold shower down on us both.

But for now I am a willing prisoner in this house, a sympathizer with the anarchic cause of snow. I will make a pot of tea and listen to the plastic radio on the counter, as glad as anyone to hear the news

that the Kiddie Corner School is closed, the Ding-Dong School, closed. the All Aboard Children’s School, closed, the Hi-Ho Nursery School, closed, along with—some will be delighted to hear—

the Toadstool School, the Little School, Little Sparrows Nursery School, Little Stars Pre-School, Peas-and-Carrots Day School the Tom Thumb Child Center, all closed, and—clap your hands—the Peanuts Play School.

So this is where the children hide all day, These are the nests where they letter and draw, where they put on their bright miniature jackets, all darting and climbing and sliding, all but the few girls whispering by the fence.

And now I am listening hard in the grandiose silence of the snow, trying to hear what those three girls are plotting, what riot is afoot, which small queen is about to be brought down.Billy Collins, “Snow Day” from Sailing Alone Around the Room: New and Selected Poems (New York: Random House, 2001). Copyright © 2001 by Billy Collins. Reprinted with the permission of Sll/Sterling Lord Literistic, Inc.

Source: Sailing Alone Around the Room: New and Selected Poems(Random House Inc., 2001)back to topRELATED CONTENTDiscover this poem’s context and related poetry, articles, and media.

POETBilly Collins

POET’S REGIONU.S., Mid-Atlantic

SUBJECTSNature, School & Learning, Weather, Activities

back to topPoems by Billy CollinsAristotleCanadaCheeriosCreaturesDesignFishing on the Susquehanna in JulyForgetfulnessHerIntroduction to PoetryIrish PoetryMadmenMan in SpaceMemorizing “The Sun Rising” by John DonneMorningNo TimeNostalgiaPrintQuestions About AngelsReading an Anthology of Chinese Poems of the Sung Dynasty, I Pause To Admire the Length and Clarity of Their TitlesReport from the SubtropicsSilenceStudy in Orange and WhiteThe BreatherThe Chairs That No One Sits InThe Death of AllegoryThe ParadeThe Wires of the NightTodayWinterWorkshopWriting in the Afterlifeback to topPoem CategorizationSUBJECTNature, School & Learning, Weather, Activities

POET’S REGIONU.S., Mid-Atlantic

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