By Carolyn Muchhala
What Illuminates
- By Carolyn Muchhala
Seven decades ago, you first inhaled
and squalled. Daily your mother bundled you
into the buggy on the snow-swept porch—
mandatory January sunshine.
Everybody knows two-faced Janus, looking
forward, looking back. Never learns
a thing from that watery light.
This is the map you were given:
Dead-end road
up North—trees,
trees. Too far in
to back out. Too narrow.
Can’t turn around.
Where did the path go?
It ended in snow. Never mind, you told yourself.
Look straight on, even if your sight’s obscured.
What illuminates, you saw,
are shadows spread in all directions.
Winter Medley
- By Carolyn Muchhala
Incandescent trees
have turned to blackened claws
They rise to grip December skies.
Black-capped chickadees
shelter in conifers, feast on frosted
pine cone seeds, indulge in
an orgy of flutters & chirps.
Now white-footed mice nest in hollows.
Now a barred owl flaps westward.
Now crow voices rasp against
the twilight glass.
December / Long Nights Moon
By Carolyn Muchhala
Night stretches
from one end
to the other.
It blankets
Lake Superior.
The moon twists and shimmers in the water,
a silky glow. Still, it’s not enough.
They grow
desperate
for light.
They pack
a few clothes.
They drive and drive and drive
into the arc of the sun.
in my dream, her journey
By Carolyn Muchhala
three crows rise
through layers of creosote sky
winter drifts over shuttered leaves
crusts the path my mother walks
dressed in a nightgown thin
as a river's skin of ice and white
in a darkened room
her face is a candle
flaring in the cold
as she turns in the circle
of my father's arms
the circle of his arms
a shadow creases
the burying snow
and i alone can hear
the crows their wings
like heartbeats
in the falling light