My father paints every snowflake. 
My mother speaks mustard seed multitudes. 

You see my father makes the snowflakes.
He wasn't assigned the job-- he
took it on as a side gig one year
when he discovered all he needed
was paint and wood and he could
build us each a roof to drop
a blizzard from--
God tells my father that he
has the snow covered-- that my father
doesn't need to work so hard to
build so many snowflakes-- 
My father turns up the radio and 
picks glitter from under his nails--
grumbles that God never made a snowflake
like him--
my father makes the type
of blizzard that everyone wants--
snow warm marshmallow melted 
coco mud mush on our fur boots--
soak our legs in the muck of candy cane--
we were all the kids of chocolate dirt 
and excited cold fingers on mugs--
Those blizzards pressed down our
our foreheads like the tightening 
of mason jars in the pot--
call the children from the shelves--
from the refraction of each ornament--
from toy trains buckled 
around our waists hula hoop me holidays--
My brother and I noticed Santa
only knows how to write in crayon.
The rattle of the basement 
is my father as he makes snow--
He's always makes the snow 
but we pretend to be surprised
when we wake up white-- glitter
under our finger nails-- new 
paint stain on his jeans--
The oven is my mother--
the bread rising on the baking sheet--
spritz cookie shot gun and 
open doors of an advent calendar--
she's the pink candle-- 
while my father makes the
snow she makes each of us mustard--
pulls us apart in seeds of quiet multitudes--
she says 
the kingdom is a snowflake or was it a mustard
seed-- we plant both in the carpet
of my house to be safe and there's where
the Christmas tree sprouts each year--
we water it with blizzard--
bake it until it scrapes the ceiling with the star--
the blue orb that hatches at night
in the flour hands of my
mother who is still counting
the lids of the mason jars in on the shelf--
my brother Joey asks if my father dresses as
Santa Claus sometimes at night.
I laugh because my father 
hammered each glisten into the 
snow flakes-- my mother broke us
into a galaxy of mustard seeds-- lit
our foreheads in tongue of flame
to lick candy canes-- 
I laugh because I don't know 
who eats the cookies-- who drinks
the milk but I do know who builds the snow
flakes and who is the oven
and who keeps the lids on the mason 
jars-- we all planted this tree to harvest 
the ornaments-- pluck them plump
and ripe in January-- dripping in coco
nectar-- we collect their mustard seeds
to plant next year--
and my father already has blue prints
for the snowflakes.