A Refugee From Cold (version 1)

The ferocious cold is spent, replaced 
with the soft calm of above zero. Sharp, 
white blue light is forgotten in 
the tamed, gray white sky. Small snow flakes 
swing like children, melting like ghosts. 

The lines of the land are gone but
the snow waits. I know it's not alive 
but I put waiting on it and leave 
blurred imprints in the melting 
layer of water and snow, reading 
the last set of shut in days 
in the scat, fur and fallen, dead limbs. 

Thin trees bend, threading through a 
broken, fitful wind. Deer, look up 
and then away, moving with old grace 
on icy, wet trails and I follow, a dumb,
animal, wanting only to have, rather
than endure, time. 


A refugee from cold (version 2)

The ferocious cold is spent, 

replaced with the soft calm 

of above zero. Trees bend. 

The deer move with their old 

grace. 

Small snow flakes swing 

like children, melting like 

ghosts. Sharp, white blue light

is forgotten in the tamed, 

gray white sky.

The snow waits. I know

it's not alive but I put 

waiting on it, read the last 

set of shut in days

in blurred imprints, the scat, 

fur and fallen, dead limbs. 

This forest invites me, 

a refugee of cold, to let go

of a brutal, indifferent past 

and allow in thoughts of  

a warm future. To inhabit,

not just endure, time.