Taking Off from Minneapolis

Blue winter—clean floors—airport tundra
Piles of mangy snow—in the land of the
Pillsbury Doughboy—large, stoic faces
With the latest Norwegian eyeware
Like squirrels with their vaults and their smiles,
Leading in austerity long, steady, contented lives—
Every backyard has black dirt, and a lake
One is for beets, beans, wheat, rapeseed,
The other to capture sunlight
And slow movement through water
And diving, like fish, underneath—
But the piers are encased in ice now,
Ripples of snow trespass over the precise geometries
On rock-hard ground, where waves of buffalo
Used to flow, yellow bulbs of industry
Take over the night, the horizontal sunset
Bruise-red and gold, eases from sight, with its reminder
That the sun isn't always like this, white.