In "The First Snowfall," how does snow both remind the speaker of his pain and heal that pain?

1 Answer | Add Yours

accessteacher's profile pic

Posted on

This poem uses snow as a trigger for certain thoughts, which bring the speaker from a position of grief to one of healing acceptance and love of life once again. Initially the snowfall that the speaker and his daughter experience forcibly reminds the speaker of how his dead daughter's gravestone is being covered with the same snow that is falling on them. This of course makes him very sad as he reflects on his loss and grief. However, when his other daughter asks him a question of where the snow comes from, he is able to shift his thinking towards happier thoughts:

I remembered the gradual patience

That fell from that cloud like snow,

Flake by flake, healing and hiding

The scar that renewed our woe.

The snow is thus compared to "gradual patience" that has the impact of reducing the pain and grief of the speaker, "healing and hiding" the "scar" that is used to represent his grief. The speaker is thus finally able to say to his daughter that snow originates from God, who is described as the "merciful father." Snow therefore moves the speaker to remember his grief at first, but then to reflect on how patience and divine love is able to heal it. The poem ends with the speaker kissing his daughter, but the speaker tells us his kiss is actually for his daughter who died, signifying a move towards acceptance of her death.


We’ve answered 319,232 questions. We can answer yours, too.

Ask a question