Mr. January

Mr January marches across the world leaving second-look wonder in his white-footed wake...

(this is the kind of weather I love to challenge with hot chocolate and cross-country skis, but for now

I am a little unhappily housebound with a heavy head-cold:( 

so I must content myself with from-the-house-shots...and hot tea

He walks in socks white-woolly

Icy kisses splice his jowls

He blusters like a bully

As he musters frigid howls

He tests best optimism

With regales of snow-sleet-hail

Fair weather feels forgotten

In the tether of his gale

He torments trees, his garment

Wrangles, tangles stark-still bark

He wails through gardens dormant

And roars through the hoary dark

He makes the maiden shiver

His fingers are deathly cold

He strakes landscapes with silver

And breaks skylines with crushed gold

He shakes the clouds; their plunder

Covers earth with downy deeps

He wakes a wanton wonder

In hearts hungry for green sweeps

While stunning us with pictures

That no earth-artist could paint

The palette of his tinctures

Fit for heaven’s fittest saint

He lavishes limp laughter

With longing and gratitude

For there will be an After

After his gust is subdued

© Janet Martin