like a leaf clings to a tree...

walking home this morning in the seattle version of snowfall, with cat power singing 'wild is the wind' in my cold-red ears...

"...we are creatures of the wind..."
here 'snowing' is defined differently. just like how the rain is only slightly more insistent than misting, snow can be so small you cant see it falling and the gradual accumulation of such super-fine flakes can take forever to be perceptible.
the prolonged process of covering over the flora happens a fraction of a millimeter at a time, and makes even the lush green landscape here look blighted by the cruelness of winter. the fineness of the brush painting everything white makes for very detailed outlining of every blade of grass. when there is less than half an inch of snow it makes the capturing of footprints--animals and people--very precise. the dark concrete in bird shapes, squirrel hops, shows stark against the white...

"...you touch me, i hear the sound of mandolins..."
this visual precision brings me aural focus and i know no better accompaniment exists. Miz Power covers like the snow. the piano peeks brightly out of velvet silence and her reluctant voice shadows the delayed gratification in the weather. the clinging of her voice, the sparse piano notes, the trepidation of advancing the rhythm, they mirror my view. i become obsessed with how she lingers over syllables, leaving empty space, singing so close to the mic you hear the texture of every letter in the words she touches with her mouth. the scratch in her vocals feels just like the bare branches with each and every finger kissed frosty, the pedal sustain touches like the insistent cold creeping past your collar and down the back of your neck--elongated shivers that leave your lower back aching--the high notes come sharp as flakes stinging your bare cheek.

"...with your kiss my life begins..."
holding all the beauty in your senses makes you hold your breath in the silences, you try to keep your mind from running ahead to fill in the gaps cuz then you'd have to back up to get in step. you believe time has slowed down just enough for you to catch each individual moment and marvel at its passing...you feel as tho the world is being caressed like a lover savoring the sensation of every inch of their beloved's skin, fingertips deliberately and ever so gently stroking every curve and angle, defining the edges, outlining the shape of things. its a leisurely smothering, the most beautiful agony of slowness...

"...let me fly away with you..."
...and true to the song ending that leaves you begging for more just when you were anticipating a cathartic payoff, before we can get to actual 'snow cover' (not just a 'dusting') the temperature rises just enough to let it subtly melt away, as a dying chord lazily falls past hearing...