Fire, Snow, Ice

Red hot woodstove embers sizzle and snap, bear up
through smoldering green wood that refuses
to be consumed for someone else's heat.

Snow falls through the night, and I awake to white
inching higher on roof top, car top, stair treads, railings.
On lilac and the shriveled orange berries of mountain ash.
It silences the rustle of hydrangeas, fills knotweed stumps--
a specter of winter's beauty that compresses.

Fall's torrent of rain lies frozen now,
suspended from culvert's mouth.
At 18 degrees, it simply lets season
dictate motion. Inside,
you sit by my woodstove,
immobilized by my three words--

I love you.

Unwilling to put a name to your own emotions,
it pains you to hear the label I bring to mine.
Your worry forms embers of vague concern,
something unnamed, as if to voice it
is to wrap it too tightly around the solitary
space you've carved out of all these years.

Like winter's water, you're bound in place,
unable to match the heat of my emotions.
You eye me carefully, tender sweet kisses,
and wonder if there is room in your life
for my expectations. Meanwhile, the space
between us grows slimmer, and you rub
your thumb over the idea of just sipping
the nectar of this thing I call "love," which--
like wood to embers,
like snow amassing,
like water freezing--
builds slowly,
rises too high,
takes prisoners.

What then?

Simply take the words
to your heart, add them
to the wood pile,
the snow mound,
the ice-bound stream
and wait to see
what spring's release brings.