January

The Cold these days {the air outside of late}

is more than bracing, worse than stinging;

it hangs in rigid flaps at the surface of your face,

it swathes the night in frost and does not take skin

for an answer. It soaks right through it, into flesh, into veins

and runs through and through until the day you bleed it dry.

So thank heavens I’m beyond that now, beyond those days

when periodic bloodletting seemed an inevitable coming of age…

The air outside of late is brittle

and deals glancing blows to innocent cheeks.

My memory of you now is much the same

I’m not sure I could

I’m young, 7 or 8 maybe, and testing the resilience

of juniper berry skin with one glitter-crusted fingernail.

just as I manage to crop all of the little horns off

of a handful of the powder-blue pebbles, the smell of their blood

still stinging my nose, a frisbee-full of shredded leaves and grasses

is thrust into my arms. I drop the berries, and they scatter

so I put down the dish of mutilated flora and kneel in the dirt

to collect back my carefully-pruned treasures. He yells at me to move faster

and 6 years later

I pour my blood out

over memories of that day