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Arii Jun 22
It’s usually said
That your fingers go numb first.
That the cold gets to your hands even through layers upon layers of thick cloth that are meant to protect it.
That you can’t tightly grab onto a lifeline when you freeze to death,
Unlike how you would in any other near-death scenario.

Next is your toes,
Your feet follow your hands, losing the feeling in them.
It’s funny, in the way that one of the first things you learn in life is to crawl and walk,
And when you’re on your knees in front of death, you lose the ability to do so.

The next to go is your ears,
They go numb too, making the world sound muffled like it’s underwater.
No hearing people screaming your name as you succumb to the cold,
Only silence in the path to the end.

Your nose goes next,
Feeling like it’s turned to ice or stone,
Smells become distantly unknown,
Only a little into freezing over.

Next are your cheeks—the rest of your face.
Red from the chill as they would in the heat
Except the cold is much more merciful in killing off your nerves before it does you.
It’s a plausible question,
Whether it hurts to smile more because your face throbs or because you’re drowning in your demise.

And then goes your chin.
It’s hard to communicate when you’re dying,
Less so to call for help,
And more so to say goodbye to everything you know.
It’s going to happen eventually,
And when it happens, you can’t guarantee you’ll be able to say goodbye,
Or even want to in the first place.
another random write from yesterday
Vika Sep 2024
I find myself offering to the death of cold.
Your love is inhospitable.
Prolonged exposure to your love
has caused numbness in my body.
I’ve learned to handle the bitterness,
But each layer that kept me warm has been stripped.

Inside of me,
the same stinging chill is found
that your heart was frosted in.
And now I understand when the sorrow became frozen.
The icy heart hardens into a glacier
when the agony remains in a fixed spot,
forced to recrystallize.

I’ll burrow myself in the comfort of snow,
stabbing myself with ice spikes I've sharpened,
knowing the only amenity
is my death tonight.
That everything I could’ve endured,
was the frost mounting against my flesh.
Aquila Nov 2019
I freeze two stages in
and she watches with adoration
what a catch,
in weather such as this
so this  idiot went through the first two stages of hypothermia bcos he never bails on fishing day
lovelywildflower Nov 2018
snow is falling
piano playing in the background
grey skies
dead leaves litter the ground
tree limbs creaking in the wind
soaked clothes
numb
no more feelings
heart frozen
head aching
body breaking
walk out to the big oak tree
heart buried in the snow
leave it
leave it there
don't care for it
hypothermic love
i gave up a long time ago

its bitter Feb 2018
Check in impatiently
hauling light luggage -
downturned eyes,
bundled fifties,
skull packed with sickly
sugarplum notions

Stiff key-card door and
three hanger closet -
leave your mittens, jacket,
and conscience dangling

Towels
cotton-knit sandpaper
no softer than well-trafficked
threadbare tawny-port carpet and
your hands and feet pretend
not to feel it

nervously,
a bit numbly,
you notice her standing
with glacial stillness
moments away from
the foot of the bed

Two crooked lampshades and
dim headboard lights
close their eyes when
the mattress springs
first compress,
the air tingling
with dustbunny snowflakes

This room is too dark now,
something like snowblind,
but you don't really want to see
do you?

Frostbite when she touches you
and somehow this bed
is more welcoming
than your own

you'll remember her
february fingertips
and hailstone hair,
a sensation of northerly winds
strange how heavy the comforter feels
sprawled across your skin

you envision an ice slab,
see it suffocate
a slow-flowing river,
and your breath quickens
if only because your lungs
have been crushed

then, just before hypothermia,
she leaves,
lights off,
wallet lighter,
you stay whiteknuckled, lightheaded,
half-consumed by a snowdrift,
beneath the duvet -
dazed

your tongue sits confused,
having asked for peppermints
and been given ice cubes instead

and when you finally rise,
and thaw your limbs
and try not the slip
on the black ice
she always leaves
by the door,

Try to forget
you paid
hourly rates
and shed your clothes
that you might find warmpth
in a blizzard
traces of being Jan 2017
I’m small enough to cry for those with frozen teardrops
who can’t get up off the side of the road to die in peace
So I'll abide in this polar freezing cold silent deliverance
where a  hollow warmth  hides the tears that  aren't for
cryin’ alone

There’s a bitter arctic wind blows right through the tree trunks
there’s no shelter leaning on the dream of the leeward other side
This winter isolation grasps on impatient pieces of frayed light
like hope a mustard sized seed of shine may move venerable
mountain peaks

Who ever knows how long salvation lasts ? They said he died
sleeping on a cardboard  comforter and blue  plastic tarp duvet;
a holey old coat stained with all what went wrong in life …
And .., I feel a sickening guilt of a warming fire's thickening
smoke

The chimney’s icicles drip an angel’s frozen teardrops
But .., I can’t find no heaven in this big ol’ world ...


                                           *wild is the wind ... January 4th, 2017
Annie Oct 2015
You are slipping through the cracks of my
Fingers
The fingers that once held Yours
Together interwoven.
Clutched in my hands,
These Mittens
Sewn between the spaces of
Each other's palms.
We were so close,
So Warm.
It's so cold without you
The fingers are always the first
To go.
V May 2015
As I walk into the cold cold river,
I start to quake and shiver
The water stabs my skin like knives
Cats have nine lives
I have only one
As I walk into the water
The bright sun
Is like a comforter
The cold seeps through my body
The birds in the distance
Chirp a sweet melody
All is lost now
This is my final bow
The cold hits my brain
I refrain
From going back
Everything goes black
This is hypothermia
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