Getting Warmer
Mont Vernon, NH
2021, Junior, Poetry & Spoken Word
Soft and pillowy
Floating through the sky like magic
It fills the leaves
It fills the ground
But today I cannot see it
Not today
Not this month
No, not at all
What happened to the snow
Was it ever going to fall?
Sitting on the windowsill where icicles one hung
Where flakes as soft as cotton balls melted on my tongue
I closed my eyes and remembered what winter used to be
Skating on frozen lakes and ponds, learning how to ski
Watching it fall and fall and fall
Not an inch of grass in sight
Snow days and warm hot cocoa
Christmas morning white
Even the muddy slush that came when spring was ‘round the corner
…seemed to disappear this year
No snow.
No slush.
Getting warmer.
Reflection
When I began thinking about how water affects me, my first thoughts were about snow. There was hardly any this year in November or December, which is pretty unusual. I remember in my childhood snow falling as early as Halloween. It was consistent and just a given part of winter for me. But as the years went on, I noticed less and less of it. It seemed that as the glaciers were melting in the poles, so was the snow up North. My poem is how I imagine the first winter with no snow will feel like. A lot of people's first thoughts with water are things like the ocean, lakes, and ponds, but they seem to forget how much water impacts the magic of winter. I really wanted to focus on the winter side of climate change and how it is affected. My poem is not informative with facts and details, but it conveys a message. I want people to think about what will happen to winter if the earth keeps going down this path. Although it isn't a happy thought, we need to understand what the impacts of climate change will look like one day. Together we all need to stop these futures from ever becoming a reality.