Graupel

There is a certain

freeze in the trees when

it is January and the ground

remains snow-coated.

You leave when you hear

the ice-chimes sing. She

is still tucked in bed, but

you are walking to elsewhere.

Light struggles to play shadows

on the pier. Steel water laps

the planks; you are an albatross,

your wings slice the clouds.

Your lips birth ghosts,

wordless silver echoes rising

to meet a smokescreen sky,

and elsewhere swallows you.

In this winter, this January

freeze, you are reborn, singing

with the trees and cascading

into granite seawater.

Home at your hearth, the fire

dies. Feathers flutter at her feet

as she tiptoes by; upturned

eyes seek an unseen sky.

(Note: revision)