Winter Solstice Poem by Robert Charles Howard

Winter Solstice



In this frigid solstice season

  frozen crystal refractors
    sift down silently from above -
      white to catch the fading rays
        clear to seal and glaze the earth.

In this bitter solstice season

  the solemn reaper roams abroad
    to complete his brutal harvest -
      guiding a hawk to an easy meal
        silhouetted against a field of white.
    or icing the path of an aging man
      whose splintered bones will not rise
        to greet the coming equinox.

In every frozen solstice season -

    we gather as we must
      huddled in fire-lit caves,
        reveling at Saturnalia,
          caroling out Christmas joy
            or lighting Hanukkah lamps -
              seizing hope for a barren world

in this festive solstice season.

December 26, 2010

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