The snow’s job is to fall steady and thick all night and all day. The sky’s job is to let it. Meanwhile, my job is to talk with BFA students about pacing novels composed of vignettes, the holy work of writing the truth, poetic forms comprising a play and helping Vets tell their stories. My job is to sit in a small circle of faculty and students talking about writing about race, what transformation through writing means anyway, and who the “we” is in a particular poem and in our lives.
All around the trees hold a thin layer of branching snow, the sky turns dim on the eastern edge, and the buildings inhale heat. Downstairs, people line up for dinner, and down the hall, someone laughs and different voices say, “Got you,” “I love you,” and “Where did you say that was?”
My mind ambles closer to where my body has landed, in a freshly-painted room of pale green before two winter’s full of falling snow, across the dream time between my two homes. I simply remind myself to breathe, feel the fatigue and dizzy swish of having landed in a surprise, and follow the line of my limbs to what comes next.
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