By: Linda M. Crate

this night was dark
stretched on for
many moons,
and when the sunlight finally
woke me to the
knowledge
i was still alive it seemed
as if i had woken
from some zombie dream;
almost lost my mind
over a nightmare—
yet i somehow managed to
retain my sanity,
and so i sit here in the shadows
of the light and golden
autumn laughter
devoid of any yellow singing
your name and grateful
for it;
the winter of you took all it
had come for,
took things i can never get back
but this winter will be
different
won’t sit shawled in the
misery of your
love—
i will make snow angels
laugh will
the cardinals, celebrate with demeter
when spring returns and all is
new and beautiful
again, and every misery of your name
is no longer etched into
my soul as i dance
in the sunshine and in the rain
reveling in the stark
beauty of the silence of life
all the flowers and butterflies
beating against the heartbeat of the world.