Winter Solstice

Blue, tense with cold and joy —
or is it the moon that makes the world seem larger?

Welted and platinum, sky soars above
this patched parquet of snowbleached yards.

When I cross over into whatever
ample vanishing waits beyond prayer,

the verge of my breathing,
will I take this with me: inner road, roofless house

where I stand, bound by the spell
of your absence and the stammel of my blood

drawing you through me—pilgrim artery,
homing vein — such distances —

like heaven, defying any subtraction of light
with its electric, effacing horizon?

Copyright © 2005 Lisa Russ Spaar All rights reserved
from Streetlight
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission