The storm came through
Like a drunken step-dad
Chilling everyone it spied
Cowering and huddled away
From windows and doors
Waiting for the torrent
To pass staying calm
And now as storms
Often do it’s sunny
The lid of clouds
Removed and what little
Heat that remained escapes
Like the aroma of
My grandmother’s chicken soup
Taken off the boil
The eastern Rockies sky
Looks like its west
A cloud bank stretches
From pane to pane
Atop which hovers delicately
Foamy white like icing
A few loose strands
Like almost invisible threads
Or perhaps even lint
Or shedded dog hair
Comes and goes as
Quickly and with little
Desire of staying like
Visitors to a hospital
And now as the
Sun makes its appearance
Low and deep all
Of it turns crimson
On this the twenty-first
Of December in Denver
When the world
In which you
Live turns cold
You turn inwards
When kindness caring
And compassion hardens
You remain soft
And warm and
Woolly I know
I lived there
In a place
Of concrete steel
And plastic concern
Was by edict
But now once
Again living in
A world of
Love and affection
I still do
Shudder at touch
My heart remained
Free and only
My mind and
Body were caged
Give me time
Please to shake
Out my wings
I will fly
Yet once again
It is truly amazing
How something as simple
As a cold can
Reduce even the mightiest
The confident and articulate
Into nothing more than
A mewing sniffing toddler
Crawling under the covers
And asking for mommy
This is what I
Think when they say
Even the old will
Turn into young again
And like a woodsman
Walking through a grove
Of towering maple trees
As I pass each
I stop to touch
Maple trees like friends
Are not my path
But show me it
They are where I
Go when I’m weary
And they shelter me
Always behind sometimes ahead
But wherever they are
I couldn’t be there
Anywhere really without them
HARLAN DIDRICKSON 