"The Snow Man" Poetry Blog.

The Snow Man
One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and the boughs
Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold along time
To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think
Of any misery in the sound of the wind,
In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land
Full of the same wind
That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,
And, nothing himself, beholds
Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.
-Wallace Stevens

     "The Snow Man" is a poem that describes winter. It tells us that only people who have truly experienced winter and "had a mind of winter" can see the beauty of it. Many people see the snow and cold and wind and see it as an ugly day. Only people that know can see the beauty of these things. The "snow man" is a part of winter, yet he isn't really anything; because of this, he beholds everything that exists before him and at the same time doesn't because he isn't really alive. To understand winter, we have to be like the snow man, or, at least, this is how I interpreted the poem. I found it a little confusing.
     For the antecedant scenario, Wallace Stevens may have been thinking about winter, or perhaps looking outside and taking into mind the different perceptions of winter: a beautiful, sparkling wonderland or a freezing, disgusting outsider.