It was that time of year again,
When cold winds came to call and bite fingers,
And stiffen air and water underfoot,
Turning the traveller’s weary trudge into a muffled creak.
Trees, stark and bare, stand with arms unburdened for the season,
Held forth in yearning for a friend to perch for company,
Looking, for all the world, like cracks in winter’s window.

It was that time of year again,
When smoke snaked from the chimneys of lonely cottages,
Strewn, carelessly along windy lanes, covered in nature’s blanket,
All colours bled to white; a canvass clear and clean,
For hands and feet to leave their mark; proof of life in the bitter blank.
Bells from yonder chapel call believers to their faith, but faith was lost,
When my love, abandoned to the cold a year ago, died a frozen death.

And now it was that time of year again