The First Snowflake

i awoke early this morning and stared in silence out my window at the snow raining down on the ivy. a snowflake appeared and i set my eyes on her, whipping and twirling, jumping and leaping, knocking on my window, beckoning me to join her dance. i asked her name but i don’t think she heard me as she slid off and joined her friends in their own snow version of red rover turn over i’m flying over...tell me, do you drop down on your knees and ask for meaning in such moments? i lost her in a haze and soon my thoughts turned to the first snowflake ever to fall from a cloud high above and how she must have felt when she dropped, suddenly alone in a world without end. I wonder what drew her to leave the warmth and softness of her pillow, did her friend triple dog dare her, did she and the other snowflakes draw straws, a game of rock, paper, scissors perhaps; or maybe the others, jealous of her shine, pushed her out, tumbling and shaking, a lone glitter in the sky. i prefer to think that it was something else, a grace, a gift of magic in the air that secretly opened, causing her to suddenly slip and slide down the trap door of her cloud, releasing her to the open sky, no longer enclosed by the fuzzy floating fog of her womb. a bright light in flight, she held on tight, unsure at first, nervous, but slowly, finding herself, a nip here, a tuck there, learning to lean into the wind and ride the wave, soon summersalts came and cartwheels too, her pigtails glowing in the breeze, her voice free, singing every song she ever knew, and then quietly, her flight in the night would come to an end, and she would land for the first time on earth – on a sharp blade of grass perhaps, or the crooked branch of an old oak, caressing her as she settled silently into a sad sleep, alone, waiting for the soft voice of her friends to comfort her and share in her shine.