This American chef, activist, and author is known for her advocacy of organic cooking favoring locally-grown ingredients, including in school lunch programs in the United States. She believes these food choices are important in that:
they help support local producers and farmers,
they are healthier,
they taste better,
they are more sustainable and environmentally friendly.
I would say this would classify as a downward comparison as the person is talking about Mark who has a poorer job situation than him and this could be used to bolster the speaker's ego or to knock poor Mark or could just be an observation.
The simile in the poem is Like an army defeated the snow hath retreated . It means that in winter season the whole landscape was covered with snow but with the advent if spring season with its bright sunny days , The snow has melted away .
