Chill That Warms

Calm – as if it wants to spread this gelid wind with balm –
apply it to us like a poultice – some mystic healing
seems to seek to seep caressingly from unexpected
sources in the winter solstice – buffering us from
its bold sub-zero sting: as if to help us grasp just this –

as all our sighing freezes into mist: there’s no resistance
we need bring to dying: the air and light outside –
could this be why they tug to be described? – say so:
there is in their colluding, odd and abnegating glow
a chill that warms: this beautiful concatenation of dark

forms of branch in leafless trees across the park,
silhouetted, stark against white glare as if to tell us so
much more is there than we can know – there are,
I think, in their sharp season – this nadir of the day
and zenith of the night – there are in all their grand

apparently withholding brightnesses, ambivalently
jarring shadows, hues and tints – provocative, alluring,
reassuring hints: the surest one of which suggests so
many other blest dimensionalities – beyond the ones
we fear, and think we get, of breath and death.



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