The Cold Room Poem by Ursula Anderson

my earliest years were spent
entombed in an iceberg

my natural and lifegiving warmth
quenched,
cold ashes,
dampened embers.

I chipped and chiseled
with my numb, blue hands
broke all my nails

but I escaped.

I see you in your own
cold room
haunted
by the ghost of
your own
visible breath

You make me cry
hot tears
and I ladle them over you
as fast as I can but
I am afraid they cool
on the way over
and you wonder
"Why is she doing this,
dumping salt water
on my deep and chilly wounds? "

I can't stop.
I miss you
though we have
always been apart.

Starting in the chill and
ice and numb
in the cold room
looking for warmth
but not recognizing it
and fearing the ladle

I learned about flint and steel
I learned to cope
and my deadened embers
came to life again
in cheery waves
of warmth I know you can see.

They are my own creation.
I was born with something
that was destroyed.
Destroyed. Utterly. Intentionally.

Of course I am attracted by the
blue and green and dead.
Of course.
But I know where it leads.
When you can see your breath,
know that it comes from your own heat.
It's enough, it's a spark, it lives.

Seek that instead.
There is attraction there.

I see your breath.
You are not done.

The cold room need not have you
and you need not live
frozen solid
alone, empty, cold.

Abandoning the familiar
is better than living with
an unnecessary disability.

Not even a prosthetic for that;
we grow new
from the stump of the old.

You have it too.
Come dry my tears
and I will warm you up
and blow a Hah into your hands
and rub your back
and hold you close

and kiss your tears away

and make a dream come true
and comfort that
nightmare
that lasted too long already.

There is heat in that
damp ember still
I will help you find it
and I will fan yours
as you have helped me
fan mine.

Yours.
Just ask.
Hah.