Not Everything About Winter is Winter
Peter Stewart O’Grady
Sometimes it’s crisp frozen leaves,
mud crunched steps, the crazy paved
surface on frozen puddles, the shapes
of naked trees, and the sun slung low
into your blinking eyes, your shadow
stretched out further than you want.
Snow lying unviolated by footprints.
Those shrinking days that invited
the cold to reconfigure everything
for the year ahead, and their slow
stretch letting Christmas seep in
under the door, tempt us to reserve
a moment to toast by the fire, watch
logs exhaust themselves to ashes.
