[467] Like Snow

Guest poem submitted by Aseem Kaul, <dattadayadhvamdamyata@>:

She, then, like snow in a dark night,
Fell secretly. And the world waked
With dazzling of the drowsy eye,
So that some muttered 'Too much light',
And drew the curtains close.
Like snow, warmer than fingers feared,
And to soil friendly;
Holding the histories of the night
In yet unmelted tracks.

	-- Robert Graves

What I love about this poem is the way the syllables fall so gently, almost
drifting into place, and the way (almost miraculous) in which Graves manages to
carry through the metaphor - conjuring up the image of a woman  with soft
fingers and half thawed eyes. I'm not sure that I really understand what Graves
is saying here; I only know that it sounds right and so incredibly fragile that
I'm almost  afraid to breathe while I'm reading it.

Aseem.

From: anonymous@

This poem relies on knowledge of a (now-archaic) English euphemistic idiom:
A "fallen woman" means a wanton woman, someone who has sinned and thus
"fallen from grace". 
By using this sensory metaphor, the poet shows both the negative
bourgeois opinion of sexuality, and the honest pleasures it can bring.