The country road I drove down this morning looked magical.

A feathered path down its middle where the few cars had passed.

A vortex of flakes pulling me through the windshield.

Boulders, trees, leaves touched by a light dusting.

The magic messed with by industrial orange dump trucks spewing their salt,

but reemerging in a parking lot, of all places.

A perfectly formed star pulled from the sky and placed on the fleece forest of my glove.

Another and another.

In relief against the black rubber strip of my car,

the honey colored curls of my daughter,

the harsh, manipulative world we live in.

A tiny reminder of

the awesome, wondrously made world we sometimes forget we live in.