One minute left
To breathe
One stream trickling away from the desert.
One bird lands to sip
Delicately, as birds will
Beakful by beakful
The sweet cool water
Life giving, nourishing.
And then with ten powerful thrusts of his wings
He is again aloft
Looking for something
Only he knows.
One bird in the sky
One story
And not much at all to tell.
But to him
It is the only story that matters.
When the world is first frostbitten
tender trees touched in thin ice
When summer shows its back
abandoning you for a faraway land
When winter’s wan face smirks at your peephole
hard fingernails tapping your door
knowing it will soon be strong
enough to crack your lock and let itself in
When everything disintegrates into blue and white and crispy brown
and the wind, mad surgeon, lacerates your summer softened skin
then the clouds part
affording you
one
glimpse
of heavenly light
a welcoming patch in which to stand
When you know you are about to lose it for good
that is when the warmest sun shines
Fresh Hell 