Melancholic-Winter Retreats Poem by Mark Heathcote

Melancholic winter retreats
like a snail to a point-of infinite infinity.
Till it isn't heard or seen of since
'Kindness is a way of killing me, '
it whispers to an opening golden daffodil.
So I must expiate my leave of you.
But I will return with sharpened teeth
and claws and four bear paws.
Your reprieve will be short-lived
I will return to deliver the ice and snow,
then-my-dandelion-friend then you'll
have to drill deeper than you'll ever grow.
I shall creep like a Mile-a-minute-vine
and jut into the horizon. I will envelop
the sky and take every maple leaf with me.
I will circle the globe and crash down
in sheets of hailstone because
winter retreats, because winter retreats
doesn't mean it accepts unwanted defeats.