from Now/here

in a bath of snowflakes i can barely see my fingers

before my face

i peel away my hometown hat then

my grandfather’s coat then the

thin jacket my love

lets me borrow so much of her then my

sweater to welcome in this freeze and slow

i place them on the white lid of a bush in this park

unsilent with passing busses

i don’t think of my father’s suicide except now

in retelling

i think of wind its inhales and how the flakes

clump in my hair

i don’t think of my dandruff how the snow

might hide it until i’m in the elevator inside

the one that only goes to even floors but

love we’re not in a metal box with moving

parts and others that are not supposed to

we’re in a garden my hands so red and bright

with cold

i could kiss you a hundred times and not feel

these hands between the spaces made of your hair

not feel the ache of trying to forget aching

or to remember your fingers testing their

flexibility on my stomach raw

but i don’t think of these now just the

snow melting into drops against my bare forearms

just the drops

fusing my short hairs together

becoming crystal again on windwhetted skin