Basho, Villon, weathermen

In one way, all poets are weathermen, in the sense of rebels, but today more literally.

Basho, just happened on this haiku today

Has it returned,
The snow
We viewed together?

Centuries later comes Villon

Ah, ou sont les neiges d'antan?

Insert your own grave accent on the ou.

Translated often as "where are the snows of yesteryear?"

To which friends in New England can say today: right here, in fact.

No snow at my house but bitter wind, warm coat, gloves, fleecy pants, beret, hood pulled over it, and the wind was hard work to walk against. Blowing from all directions. I kept a close eye on the old trees as I went. They can come down with a split second of warning.  You listen for that creaking sound.  If you hear it, you run.

A 75' tree came down on a neighbor's house a couple of years ago. Her son, out on the patio playing cards, with beverages, with friends, heard the sound, yelled RUN, and they all as one man, first seized their beer (!) then ran.

 The tree crushed the fence and all the chairs and table they'd been sitting at. Then, very male, they set up the game indoors, hunting for more cards and refills. Yes, teenage boys, why do you ask?

Meanwhile his mother, white and shaking, ran to my house to decompress. We had tea.