Niphredil1 Jan 2006

The idea was of someone lying beneath a cedar tree, looking up; what they would see is a dark web of branches, framed by lighter foggy sky. Hence, the cedar tree is 'darkling', from that person's point of view. Nightfall would darken those gaps of foggy sky, rendering the landscape entirely black.

Besides, it doesn't even start snowing till the stanza before last! The 'softness' in the last stanza is meant to convey the image that the narrator is covered in snow. I'm afraid my logic still holds... in addition to the fact that I don't *have* to describe snow falling on somebody's face. :-)