Winter looms gentle
Just beyond the threshold
Peeking in through windows
Amidst the leaves of the trees one is grateful to
For covering one's view with green again
Winter comes in stealthy steps
Much like the first snowfall
With silent steps
Delighting one with the cool feathery touch
Snow alights in hair, on shoulders,
Melting with a breath
For now while warmth still lasts -
Brings to heart delight of memories of all those winters
Silence and solitude and velvet deep blue heavens lit with myriad stars
Days lit with soft gold sun and snow brilliant settled on earth with
Millions of stars crackling under one's footsteps
Until in momentary light melting under sun -
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Winters of long ago,
Not as foggy in memory as the mornings were
Biting cold bleeding feet, elbows
Cold that seeped then in the bones and
Brought a strong health of youth to crumbling long before its time
Mother lovingly giving me her own mink coat to wear to school
Enveloping me with her love and warmth forever -
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Winter's last few days in another land,
Very first sojourn away from homeland,
Via winter's own Nordic lands
Reached after a cold land nevertheless giving a welcome as warm as possible in transit
The snowstorm that delayed arrival and journey
Seen only in its aftereffects from afar -
Arriving at edge of evergreen forest with its myriad paths
Another maternal heart caring for my vulnerability
Drying my hair, giving me her own prized camel coat
Looking on with surprised appreciation at us and
Telling me I looked good, however lacking in view of her habitat -
Snow on ground in small heaps
On forest paths and on sides
Amongst evergreen pines and spruces in evergreen forests
A last flurry before early morn leaving a powdery trace in backyard
Below the blue spruce.
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Eastern shores of land across the globe
Cold jumping in with sudden drops of temperature
Unlike back home, here it did not step gently or even climb running up or down
It dropped or jumped up from one day to next
If one did not like the weather of the day, one had only to wait
And it changed -
And so the cold comes swooping in from icy fields north
Arctic winds its wings and strong its bite
One shivered on bus stops, wondering how much more
Thanksgiving dinner, one's usual - one was new to this land
Then someone said, look, there is snow -
And then it was magic, with white flakes floating down
Shining softly crystals, lightly like cottonwool
Silence and just
Bliss of heart,
From heaven to heart a direct gentle melody -
Never forgot that beauty -
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Another cold day
Brought yet another relief
Cold and wind with its chill turned bones to water
The only other youth on the bus stop was almost dancing
One could see why -
Standing still was colder
Surviving that hour brought relief, exhilaration
One shall survive after all, was the certainty -
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Winters of going up unknown mountains
Snow all around and one in cable cars open to wind
Winters of traipsing through a foot deep snow the half hour to work
Of rare ciders with cinnamon sticks
Ice forming sculptures off tree branches,
And one day of icy rain sticking one's eyelids shut with ice
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Missing winter for years,
Serendipitous finding someone who loved it more, missed it far more
Find winter again years later
In another land, with much less cold
Castles and trees and ice forming sculptures beautiful in light of Nordic sun
And Alps awash with snow everlasting
Ever delightful -
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And then the beauty of another home for a brief respite
With a gentle symphony of snow lit by moonlight and stars on peaks towering high
Peaking through the window and greeting in the balcony
The beauty that stole heart and
Time after time one went out to greet
Through nights -
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Winter comes and waits now
Just beyond the threshold
Peeking through green foliage of a Neem tree and an evergreen that shade our view
Gentle snow settles on head,
Light falls now dim -
If winter is like the softly brilliant peaks moonlit
Like the silence of snowfall in mountains on evergreens
The bliss of floating flakes from heaven to heart,
Oh, welcome winter -
An interlude of bright white through day and night
Before the blue of ocean and heavens envelope one
And one is one with the Divine
Blue Gold Pink
Dawn.
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