The Color of Snow

Vermeer asked the maid
What color are clouds?
And he wouldn't take white
for an answer. She looked
hard at the Delft sky,
then slow replied
yellow and green...red!

In snow I see red, too,
on my way down from Miller Mesa.
I've been snowshoeing,
soft slapping and crunching
what's new fallen,
all afternoon following
winter-transformed trails
through untouched meadows,
hushed forest of laden pines
and naked aspens, leaving
a giant's deep tracks.

Now the sky's lavender
and the distant peaks
I try to name violet
as late sun paints shadows
on boulders and drifts,
broad brushstrokes
over a canvas of foothills,
sometimes blue and yes green.