Midwinter Requiem by Erin Cisney

Midwinter Requiem

you; indecipherable in that static

the broadest slice of a pen

couldn’t assimilate you into this universe.

January is the worst time to apologize,

swing of an axe in the dark broom

of tomorrow, my heart - silent

waiting out the interim blues and cold,

a winter of self-loathing where once

you were the warmest flesh

on a street corner, when once

I kept your picture side by side

with my mother’s, desilvered

because I don’t know that woman.

but I know you, the careful keep

of nightfall in your eaves, a crust

of crystalline in the black

of your eyelashes, backlit

under the heaviest constellations.

quietly, the galaxy is sewing light

into the milky expanse

of our irrevocable future,

no thought for us or our prophecies,

just a passive machine

meticulously eating the night.

Erin Cisney

Erin Cisney is a poet from Lancaster, Pennsylvania who’s work has appeared in such places as Spry Lit Journal, rust & moth and Literary Orphans, among others. Her first collection of poetry, Anatomy Museum, was released in Jan 2020 by Unsolicited Press. Twitter: @erin_cisney

About This Poem

"This poem is a reflection on loss and the passage of time."