The Snow Sledge Drives Through Lacquered Lands (Final Version) Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

the snow sledge drives through lacquered lands
and I have lost my way again
biting in half for sustenance

the raspberry chill of former syllables.

Anna Akhmatova: you are in my heart
but the Snow Maid's pastel musings still
could vanish overnight in any country where

darkness singes, mimics light since
beauty is always melting here on earth.
and sometimes by decree.

Anna Akhmatova, you are in my heart
even though I am hardly Russian
and I don't know why your

white flocks have been driven to
my door, as though seeking shelter-
in every weather your especial Firebird gleams

fiercely above these scenes of quite human
distress where with each fresh travesty you
do need air to breathe and poetry

to remember who you are

even when burned beyond all cognition
the former landscapes
turn to ash
in memory's red gold anguished stash

or when standing in the ruins or in
the snow-clouded hands of God-

mary angela douglas 9 september 2009; 30 september 2023