Shroud

Photo © 2017 Jennifer Wagner

Each season has its own offering.  Spring buds.  Summer glows.  Autumn colors.  Winter shrouds.  In winter, we hold contradictions up to the waning light, swirl them round the glass, sip.  Our losses are bettered in this reflection, when we can begin to see what good comes even after the fissured earth cracks again, when what remains softens, fills.

how silent now

this path strewn with jagged stones

a softening of snow

© 2017 Jennifer Wagner

offering

photo © 2017 jennifer wagner

a fourteen-year-old finger

has written R.I.P.

on the dirt of the grave in our backyard—

now crisp

in frost

the dirt clods

turn up in ant-like hills

the air is sweet offering,

unseasoned firewood, fresh chopped cords,

some stacked, some piled, waiting—

for lifting by strong arms

—like i am, scattered

near this cross,

lining up my betrayals

before you—

where I remember

how far,

how far

you’ve carried me

© 2017 Jennifer Wagner