Prologue:
It enters as a nonconformist ought –
gaslighting us with plus or minus signs,
a relative invited by default,
whose days are twenty-eight or twenty-nine.
Detente between austerity and ease
was brokered by this hapless block of days,
allegedly – but winter’s not appeased,
and spring has yet to show its milder ways.
1. Limbo
I’m bruised but can’t remember how or why –
and in this rush of drunkenness anew
I feel as if I’d fallen from the sky,
and press the season: Tell me, who are you?
2. Groundhog Day
A prophetic old rodent named Phil
can predict how much time’s left until
spring arrives, and it’s clear
that his shadow appeared –
we’ll have winter for six more weeks, still.
3. It Is Written
in ink on parchment,
chalk on slate,
blood on soil:
Freedom!
4. Saint Rosa
The opening salvo
for the revolution
was a single word:
No!
5. Cold Snap
Old snow lingers
and we are already
discussing spring crops.
6. For Winter
The outside world is much too big,
the inside world, too small;
this life is not a simple gig –
it’s wilderness or wall.
The universe, that sprawling host
of all that’s veiled or seen,
and molecules that seem so close,
are mostly space between.
7. Most Mornings
A small white moon
keeps my tides in motion,
steam curls into a script
no one can translate,
silence taps its foot impatiently,
and I swipe away the world
that comes to test my faith.
8. Everything
Everything is memory,
until it isn’t;
geese stand on hard snow,
leaving no footprints.
9. Note To Self
Did you notice
a little more sun today?
Can you hear the season
pleading its case –
What good is light
without salt on its boots,
without iron flavored blood,
without a mess to clean up?
Do you remember that tulip
sleeping below ground,
waiting for earth to tilt in its favor?
It is already beginning.
10. Liminal
Between worlds,
a membrane of space,
an untethered moment,
your hand
about to let go.
11. Half-light
Whenever you prepare a table,
remember to set a place for sadness;
when you are atop a mountain,
a valley will be in full view;
when the sun brightens your face,
your shadow trails behind;
and when you are at a beginning,
the ending is already certain.
12. Darwin Day
But have we really evolved?
13. Thaw
The seasons negotiate like lovers,
but the day refuses to budge;
it has already claimed my best hours.
I sit on the edge of the bed,
realize I’m wearing all black today.
Snow on the roof drips into the gutter,
the rhythm of winter’s blood
outside my window like a funeral drum.
14. Valentine’s Day
Chocolate only makes us fat,
roses perish, just like that;
greeting cards go in the trash,
sex is over in a flash;
fancy meals and jewelry
are subtle forms of bribery;
I love you more than that, my dear,
each day, and week, and month, and year.
15. The Day After
Winter doesn’t ask permission
to lay its icy hands on you
like a hometown prophet
who guarantees a coming thaw,
who promises joy in the morning;
we only see the long night –
footprints in the gray crust,
old arrivals and departures
slowly erased beneath new snow.
16. Presidents Day
One side swears by him.
One side swears at him.
I swear, I will not throw in
with either side.
17. Festivals
a. Fire Horse
A new year,
its mane and tail
lit with resolve;
the moon beginning again,
again.
b. Fat Tuesday
Amid the debauchery,
environmentally safe beads.
18. Nineveh (for Ash Wednesday)
Some of us wait beneath a vine
for an apocalypse;
some of us repent
in burlap and ashes;
some of us
can’t tell difference.
19. Storm
An overkill of droplets
penetrates the landscape;
the sky is a cold grave blanket,
its reflection explodes in puddles.
There is no metaphor,
no resolution, no music –
just a mindless torrent
unable to cleanse a fallen world.
20. From Another Room
If a clock ticks in a room
and no one is there to hear it,
does time still pass?
21. Still
The day before –
even the dogs sleep through breakfast.
22. Blizzard
How
can the sky can be gray as salt on a fender,
and the snow covered ground so pure?
How
are the old man who hates snow,
and the child who loved it, the same?
23. Envelope
It arrives without a return address,
bearing my name like it knows me;
inside, a small blue piece of sky
and a ten percent off coupon
for the remainder.
24. Early Morning Call
Daylight leaks in sideways
and splashes onto everything.
It categorizes the room –
the half read novel,
the spinning globe,
the umbrella by the door;
it maps out the silence,
keeps a ledger of dust,
notates the ringing in my ears.
I wait for a premise,
for the day to become possible,
for some cold open
to drop me into my own life.
Outside, a car goes by,
its tires crunching over ice.
25. A Chair
My chair has perfect posture.
It chastises me when I slump
at the end of the day.
26. Thoughts on Dust
Why do we never run out of dust?
Too bad it’s not a valuable commodity.
Where is it before it appears on furniture?
How does it know when the time is right?
It seems to gather only when no one is there.
If I never leave the room, will I never have to dust?
27. I was not
drunk,
dreaming,
delusional,
diseased,
or dumb –
I simply misplaced the morning.
28. Soon
Soon the tulips,
the knotweed and spurge;
soon the tomatoes,
the aphids and hornworms;
soon my aching hips,
another year gone;
soon the fall of man
springing up again.
Epilogue:
Panthera Leo’s on the prowl,
he sports an alpha mane;
his roar exclaims The time is now
for winter’s spring campaign!
