Darkening  [winter] 

tilted on your solstice course

you stare into your shadow, 

your footsteps relentless, numb 

to your own cold, relentless 

you expand a frozen sea 

between us, march mindless 

into the burning ice of nothing, 

onyx as the unforgiving 

blade of night. 

somewhere lingers light 

you leave behind. there is cold 

comfort in the moon’s silver 

slippers, discarded and scarring 

the broken road we walk 

unfeeling. 

the lilies are dead now. 

crows hulk in the hearts 

of barren trees. sleep 

is a myth crypt-cold, clenched 

in an absent past. you wander 

through your own darkness 

a moon-bleached shell 

until some distant song 

sirens a new sea, 

calls up a faint memory 

of pulsing grass, a desire 

breathless for the touch 

of flowers.