At night the valley dreamed of snow,
lost Christmas angels with dark-white wings
flailing the hills.
I dreamed a poem, perfect
as the first five-pointed flake,
that melted at dawn:
a Janus-time
to peer back at guttering dark days,
trajectories of the spent year.
And then snow fell.
Within an hour, a world immaculate
as January's new-hung page.
We breathe the radiant air like men new-born.
The children rush before us.
As in a dream of snow
we track through crystal fields
to the green horizon
‘Men new-born’ is subtly rearranges the natural word order for a feeling of strangeness– newness, even. ‘Radiant’ is a prelude to the intense brightness that will be developed in the final lines. It normally applies to the look of something, but air is invisible. For the speaker, the New Year illuminates even things which you can’t see. 

New Year Snow