Dogwood Snow (poem in progress)

Dogwood Snow

Driving home through a January squall,

I squint through the windshield at the highway.

In the passenger seat you snore lightly

as the car whooshes through

this thick, pallid curtain.

Then a tractor trailer’s beams

cut quickly

through the white

and I see

how quietly,

how easily

we could slip

across

the center line.

If we do,

please scatter our ashes

beneath a late spring–budding dogwood,

so we can look up

through the blooms

at every phase of the summer moon.

Or, if it is winter,

just go out

into a midmorning snowfall

and walk through the hush,

into the very bones of winter.

By the time we creep

into the driveway,

trailer long behind us,

I get out of the car,

walk through the new snow,

palms upward,

catching snowflakes,

catching dogwood petals.

-HMMooreNiver

(Note, photo actually of a star magnolia, but the image fits.)