Dormant

In winter my mother would turn blue

Light blue half-moons of chill imbedded

Under her fingernails

Winter’s dry breath wicking the moisture

From her lips and leaving them

Cracked with painful canyons of rusty red

 

While I played outside

Burrrowing adventures through the snow

And peering under the pond’s skirt of ice

To catch glimpses of its secret world

Of dormant life.

 

I am cold now.  Winter has finally caught me.

I find a strange peace in knowing my mother’s

Winter waiting is reborn in me. Like her,

I will shed my cloak of ice and return

When the earth needs my tending.