Surrender

Today, long-lingering snow surrenders
a white mist that hangs above
the broken stalks of corn,
as gold as the fading strands of dawn;

Blurring the bare trees
Too wise to bud in this mid-winter reprieve;
Drifting among last year’s milk pods,
Now open and blown,
Where the drab sparrow flits
In hopes of a silky seed.

Is surrender a weakness,
or a metamorphosis—
a change of the form or nature of a thing
into a completely different one—
When I surrender, am I snow,
Or mist?

-Patricia Thrushart
www.thewatershedjournal.org/