My god lives here
in the darkness,
in the snow,
in buckets of sap,
the soul of the trees,
flowing by the freeze and thaw
of howling night and gentle day,
like me,
learning to flow
with ice in my lungs
and hot sugar crystals glazing
my wind-ravaged cheeks.
On split lips,
I taste something elemental.
Pine needles, cold.
The sweat of the mountain.
The proximity to the fire and boil
that is not my baptismal font.
My god lives in the winter
and the snow.
Indigo Tuesday 