The snow was already falling when we awoke
that Thursday morning, January 26th.
The weatherman (they were almost all
men back then) predicted only four inches
so we dressed and walked to school as usual.
Then the flakes became clumps
like the frosted fossils of arctic milkweed pods
and they just kept coming all day,
past the twilight as we staggered home
sinking with every step, and into the deepening night.
There was no school Friday when the snow
finally stopped around 10 a.m., having reached
23 inches, a record that has held ever since.
The blizzard that was an infuriating frustration
for adults was pure delight to the rest of us.
We spent much of that weekend sledding
where we could never sled before
and jumping off of roofs into snowbanks
that were taller than many of us.
There were tragedies, too, of course ―
a rash of lootings in the city,
a little girl gunned down in the crossfire
between looters and police, several people
who suffered heart attacks shoveling snow
and even a minister run over by a snow plow,
poor devil, poor snow angel. 
What I recall most clearly though
is the gentle hiss of the snow falling
like an air mattress springing a tiny leak 
or the world folding in on itself in slow motion: 
the illusory sound of peace in which, 
for once, I could sleep through the night.