Year’s Turning

White quiet places in the snow Were where I went, On spreading landscapes of this peace, With the open sheets of a long night still unslept. I saw the counterpane was spread On random flesh that limned a solemn shape Beneath the coverlet, bright coverlet of grace.

These are familiar hills. There was a fever here, a threshing, tossing, Scarlet season shedding jagged hours. These became wind-swept places. Silenced by shifting snow, the days Said “quiet,” nights prayed “sleep— O silently, be healed at a tranquil pace.”

It was a cover under which life grew, For in this place where gracefall drifted light, See how the little hills leap up, Conforming now to trusted death but Rilled now, vastly rilled and rivered now by Rushing or gently melting— Drink now. Spring was an old flame Spring was an old thirst Quenched.