in my mind, it was always
a perfect ten
below zero, just cold enough
for me to shiver
and for your nose to turn a rosy pink
and for me to hide a dark thought
behind warm words, excused
by the curtain of soft snow
falling around us

i guess i overplayed this scene
i guess i cut and stripped it
set music to our footsteps
and played it up, all romantic angles
and close-up frames
hovering too long
over your awkward, shifting smile

i guess it wasn't really musical
no artsy, black-and-white short film
not even worth the imagery
that i gave it in each long piece of poetry
just worth enough
for me to hum along
when i hear the song
that i put to the scene, hoping
you'd recognize the tune

here in the cutting-room of my heart
i gave up
sat down on the floor, scattered images
floating down
and i grabbed my scissors
cutting each one into a snowflake
before it hit the ground
trying to recreate that scene
the way i remembered it
and in the darkness, i could ignore
the desperate feeling
of an imagination run too wild

i guess i overplayed this tune
but sometimes
when the words don't come easily
to my real-time writing, i am forced
to look backwards in time and space
across mountains of disgraced, forgotten things
back to a time
when all i could write about was you