Snow Days

Bill Collins poem Snow Days is a perfect example of using image to convey its story.
When you first read the poem the reader perceives and is able to imagine what it looks the
morning after a snow storm. But what Collins is actually saying through this images and
descriptions is related to serenity, soldiers, and war. I understood the poems real message after
reading it several times, every time I read it again I found new messages that are underneath
each image descriptions.
The first stanza starts by unfolding you the scenario, white flag waving over
everything, Collins uses symbolisms and personification throughout the entire poem. The
white flag resembles a feeling of peace and serenity, the rest of the description in that first
stanza continues to project the feeling that a war has just ended and not its time for peace and
recovery. Like the old say after the storm there is always serenity. Due to the description of war
and peace, I could also see the soldiers that are represented by the kids. The panoramic view
of the snow covering everything is a double standard Collins use to both give it a cold feeling
and a sad denotation in which both his message and the actual panoramic perception go along
hand to hand.
On the second stanza Collins describes how buildings both from the government and
private are all buried under snow, give the reader the sense of how the it is beautiful image but
at the same time tragic because business are not working and people have to stay prisoners
in their houses. It conveys the message of a war ending and everyone was hiding in their houses
with fear of going out. But at the same time its transmits the feeling of freedom, But now I am

a willing prisoner in this house, a sympathizer with the anarchic cause of snow. I will make a pot
of tea and listen to the plastic radio on the counter, as glad as anyone to hear the news. He
basically tells the reader how he is still afraid to go out and he is glad to hear the news that war
is over.
There are two stanzas in which he continually describes the schools being closed and
how kids are happy to hear the news. He mentions how this schools were the place where kids
would spend the entire day, but he is portraying how soldier trained and got their bright
miniature jackets but not any more since war has finished.
The entire poem is revolved around the image of war, serenity and the soldiers and
citizens with the actual snow that basically suspended everything in the town. Bill Collins uses
effectively throughout the entire poem image to convey the real message that like I have
mentioned above relates to war and peace. I do think that this poem is a perfect example to
show how concrete images, metaphors, abstractions, hyperboles can be used in order to
transmit a message, feelings, and a story.