It's a frigid January
With gloomy sky,
Depressing weather, and
Falling snow.
Yet, I don’t care!

I want to play,
I want to have fun,
I want to climb in the trees,
I want to be free,
I want to be present,
I want to feel alive!

Winter will not take hold of
My love for nature,
I will forever have an eagerness to
Dance to the eternal melody of life!

Hussein Dekmak

I have memories
Of lying down in the backyard
Of my childhood home
Dressed in a hug
Parka, snow bibs, and gloves a size too big
The world had grown completely silent
All my fears held back
By a curtain of snowflakes

Sometimes
when the world is too loud
And everything is a little too much
My mind will wander off
To a snowy neighborhood
At night
In a small town

Often times this mental space
holds only darkness
All my developmental flaws
Packed away in moving boxes
Thick black smoke seeps between the cracks
Of pristine cardboard and plastic
Being loaded onto a truck
A size too small

It’s funny
That house never felt like a home
But sometimes
When the world was wrapped
In a blanket of snow
I felt peace and warmth
Out in the cold

For miles the white path leads
Silent, still, crisp air

Only a slight crunch beneath feet
Too cold to be damp

Come! We will walk
And feel the stillness of snow

Snow began in mordant gray dusk,
a silent sprinkle of crystal light twinkle,
attaché charm to the simply ordinary.

Purple skies drew black as dreary fought back
to obscure winter’s mask of ceramic magique.

Yellow sodium campus lights slow ignite to golden
halo bright, their intense, saintly glows casting rivers
of shadow and a golden glisten to the snowflakes that fall
twisting, in silence, in grace, to present winter's face.

I saw Sting in the lobby this morning, we were going out and he was coming in. Lisa nudged me, “Sting” was all she whispered. He was with a woman and a man. The woman was talking to the doorman. Sting was dressed all in black except for a long stark-white cashmere scarf, he was chatting and working a dark-gray French-flat-cap around in his hands. His hair is very short and white.

We wanted to walk in the snow, if only for a minute.
A gust of wind caught us as we reached the sidewalk. The two American flags, on either side of the entrance, went rigid, at 9-o’clock as if saluting us. “Jeeez!” I said, like the Georgia girl I am - or was. “Don’t be a baby,” Lisa answered, like a true, pittyless New Yorker but her cheeks had turned a child-like pink. She flipped up her collar.

I patted my pocket, relieved to feel my phone and know that if we froze to death the authorities could use “find my friends” to locate our bodies.

Leeza joins us a moment later and I can’t help but notice that she’s dressed like it’s a cool fall day. Back in the day, when my brother would dress like summer even though temperatures in Georgia had dipped cruelly into the fifties. Seeing him, my mom would say, “Where there’s no sense, there’s no feeling,” but I don’t.

“Did you see Sting?” I asked Leeza (12). She gives me a blank look. “Sting”, I said, “the lead singer for The Police?” I add, as clarification. “I don’t know who that is,” she says flatly. “He was famous,” I say in surrender, “a long time ago, in the 90s.” Maybe the next generation won’t be as celebrity driven.

Thank God Lisa suggested I pin my artist-beret down or it would have blown away, like my resolve to walk in the snow. Still, I followed Lisa into the park like a cat on a leash - unwilling to be seen as any less Canadian. The show crunched like we were trampling over snow-cones.

Trees began turning away the wind as we entered Central Park, “I think we may survive.” I said cheerfully. Just because you're freezing to death doesn’t mean you can’t be ​​affable.

Why don’t pigeons freeze to death - I thought birds flew south for the winter?

music helps me feel
my blood flowing
it brings back my life
when I'm frostbitten

the lyrics I hear
makes my heartbeat
makes my breath low
makes my love fly
I wish I could be
like that all the time
because when the tune dies
all I hear is my head go
"where is your love for him?
did it die too, darling?"

Watching the snow fall
Touching the pavement, pelting the wall,
Melts time and time again, and call and call

On windy hilltops soft in the flow
Brighter and brighter, the streetlamps glow,
The robin orange-red breast on show.