Advent

I sleep well in winter.  Better to comfort one's self with warmth from the hearth, crackling, snapping, blazing

and rest

than take haste to not hope.

The swans linger
            till the pale grass is beset by frost and wind.
Who has seen their lonely flight?

One breath is a hard, cold fact. I stay awake, alert. 

My arctic landscape appears

                                 under a canopy of fire-lit clouds

and prepares me for the promise I expect to come. 

Hope and pray in Advent wonderment.