Smoke

Winter fills my lungs with smoke,
I breathe in the new year
in this old house. Winter of locked doors,

empty rooms, winter of ill winds,
thrashing rains. Winter,
was I always this afraid?

Smoke billows from the bonnet,
I think ‘house’ not ‘car.’
I think beautiful bonfire. I think

your blood into flames, your charts
into char. I think with your precision.
O how we both know precisely

more than the other now – you,
how to go, me, how to go without.
Yet, here you are

asking from across another winter’s
...