Snow is water cooled crystal-quick,
mineral and posed;
sleet is snow cast off a lattice,
scaffoldless and smooth;
and hail is rain that fell up, gathered like belief
until its weight gave in to the fact of Earth.
Tonight the sky is clear but
late October in southern New England
I ought to be ready for anything. I take off
my ragged hat. I stand upon my roof alone,
hunched apostrophe waiting for the telescope
to fill with a light that falls only in darkness.
Up here no one to speculate how fast
I might descend.
From the shared and unpredictable night
I pull a new precipitation,
drop a comet on the world.