Snow Water

Yesterday's snowflake reminded me of a Michael Longley poem called Snow Water. In the poem Longley, a "fastidious brewer of tea, a tea Connoiseur as well as a poet, " asks the reader to bring him the gift of snow water to make his tea on his 60th birthday.

You can listen to him read it here. I love the quietness of the poem, like the gorgeous camera work in Snow Falling on Cedars of melting water droplets from leaves and pine needles.

We heard Longley read this poem in Sligo on his 64th birthday. The next day he gave an interview and talked about how his writing is changing as he ages:

"...I'm interested in getting simpler. I think that's the real challenge: to be polite and graceful and simple. The drift is towards being less and less “artistic” and simpler, and rising to, you know, the directness of the late self-portraits of Rembrandt or the last string quartets of Beethoven. I don't mean to say they aren't complex, in their conception and execution, but the effect is direct and simple."

This poem is great too about a family retreat home. "Home is a hollow between the waves..." is my favorite part.