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38 Frozen Light I wake in the middle of a clang, the clock glowing 4:16 A.M. Dream sighs, smells of cold-damp hang like winterberries. Nothing stirs. No one is awake. Something’s in the barn disturbing the new harvester. Pulling on the thickest Christmas socks I ever received, I think, What can anything do to such a hard machine? Go back to sleep. But I know I won’t. A light is on under the snow and the moon’s the size of a washtub that only early January produces. As I tread to the barn in loose boots, the ironies begin to untrim the tree of my mind: It is night, but bright enough to show the wide door of this livestock enclosure I’ve padlocked to house an appliance. My hundred Herefords scatter through hilly pastures; I fret for a new device as if it could shiver. Stars take hold of the pull rope of morning. Oscar, our tabby, is silhouetted in the loft, chomping the barn rat he chased all autumn. His whiskers twinkle in false dawn. I stand squarely in the center of everything that I love. ...

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