Art

Poetry: “Hibernation”

 -  -  95


When snow and ice hit your window 

and you’re wrapped in a nest of blankets, 

All you can do is sleep. 

The outside air, it hurts your body, 

your lungs refuse it. 

You long for nature. 

Wondering how little birds don’t fly south sooner.  

Even with the dawn, wind pierces. 

Your lungs inhale the exhaust from the register.  

And you tell yourself, 

“You still have ten fingers and ten toes.  

Allow what is, to be.” 

With that, the paperback book rocks out of your grasp, you drift, 

Lightweight 

Everything is black, empty. 

Another deep breath and you see yourself, 

Hugging the white comforter, chest cradling your knees. 

You’re vulnerable. 

Your brain, so exhausted from  

from the distractions of 

inputting and outputting, 

Finally has some time alone. 

Maybe it lights a little tea candle. 

And spills wax in the bathtub 

It eats a meal that it cooked itself,  

and watches cartoons, telling itself jokes. 

Maybe it even reminds itself of its ten fingers and ten toes. 

Maybe it also looks after itself like  

a child.

 

One thing I do know for certain is that it dreams of warmer days. 

Ones where it can sleep under the sun in its front lawn, 

and ride its bike through town.  

Ones where it no longer has to will your back and shoulders from tensing up. 

and your lungs taste sweet. 

But right now, we eat and sleep. 

Eat and Sleep. 

So much so, we wonder if everything. 

is okay. 

And so do others. 

But we keep giving to everyone.  

Because that’s what fulfills us, 

what warms us when everything freezes. 

If all else fails,  

anger can heat us up.  

Eat and Sleep. 

Soon we will rise again.  

And the hunting ground will soon be ours.   

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