prepare for winter | a political allegory

prepare for winter

& its winds, knocking down doors;

the white angels are here to lift you

up up and away

fasten your wrists,

the plane departs now.

tie your stories to your chest,

with shoelace, thread, grass,

anything the wind eschews.

press them hard against your ribs; 

the stories, not you, or maybe both, 

are what they long to decimate.

“welcome to the winter wonderland,”

the sign is carved from ice,

and from far away it gleams,

all edges bright and clean 

and sharp; 

a welcome so effulgent, so lustrous, 

you might mistake it for gentleness;

but touch the land it guards

& it will burn your skin numb,

& ultimately melt mockingly.

a greeting to all that dream,

unless you are too resplendent

for the chalky white of the snow

prepare for winter

& watch the hills as they sparkle

with a kind of warning,

an elegance that requires silence

to stay beautiful.

how do you live?

with a cold that knows the names

of the ice palaces you carved

yet remembers your name only

long enough to mispronounce it

with a place that loves its own reflection

too much to look up and notice 

those shivering in the bleak, wintry rime

how could you live?

prepare for winter. but barricades are futile,

so rehearse your answers, carve them in stone, 

before the winds can rearrange them 

and carry away the truth you practiced.

and if you must walk, walk with weight,

for your footprints are already 

filling       with      white 

each time you lift a heel.

this world 

keeps trying

to erase you

winter presses its thumb

against your existence, and

your screams may not save you,

but silence never will.