© 2011 Heidi Garnett

 

Put Away Things

Such winters
the fields are draped with flannel sheets
saved for times like this. The non-descript shapes
of summer, put away things and light
lean and striped as a homeless cat
presses its nose against a window
and melts a spot the size of a dime
and peeks in.

If I could
I'd find a rock and punch a hole
in the sky. You'd know then
by the rain I was coming. But, the truth is
winter is harder than it looks,
igneous in its determination, sharp and cold
as a knife. Icicles hang from lampposts
signs tied around their throats:
I refused to fight for love.

Maybe in April or May
the clouds will break open again
and be ploughed into rows like the fields
and the dogs running to greet me
when I walk up the road. And you
at the window a south-facing garden
where I can pick daffodils
by the armful.