In the frozen field the stubble is no cover
from the wind’s teeth.
The snow is too frigid to squeak
though it winces a little.
The cold with its fingernails
reaches into you up to its knuckles.
I would welcome warmth, but first
we need this cold,
to kill the ticks and pine beetles,
to tamp the allergens, to balance things,
once it was to fill the ice houses,
still to skate and ski.
Good and cold.
It toughens you,
not only if you’re from Finland.
If repentance is a refining fire
maybe it’s ice, too:
the six-bladed knives of truth
cutting soul from spirit, joints from marrow,
the shimmering halo of frost
that outlines everything you do so you can’t miss it,
the way you find out what keeps you warm
and what fails. Struggling with a zipper or a key,
the humility of being weak and fragile.
And the weather report that one day you will be
irretrievably cold, and still as ice.
And maybe also the deep forgetfulness of snow
that forgives and beautifies everything
(a grace not cheap, with all that shoveling).
The cold creeps in, murmuring
that all heat is a gift from beyond.
Just think. Out here even the warmth
of your plain, dumb body could save a life.
________________
Weather Report
Cold,
with raging fires.
Expect drought and floods,
day and night,
which also,
like all of us,
will pass.
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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