Waking to Winter

I wonder whether I woke to heaven:
the wood all clouds. Out my bedroom
window, only two tall black trees
stand clear, the pines mere smears
of soft watercolor green. Am I afloat
in this new, white-veiled world?

I feel my own breath now, and
the winter dawn on me,
understand that snow, not clouds,
swirls through the wood. Head
on my pillow, I study the squall, lost
in wonder, feeling I woke to heaven.

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After Soft Pines, watercolor by Holly Hawthorn

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Sally Nacker was awarded the Edwin Way Teale writer’s residency in 2020 where she enjoyed a week of solitude on 168 acres of nature. Since then she has moved to a small house in the woods. Publishing credits include The Orchard’s Poetry Journal, Blue Unicorn, One Art, Mezzo Cammin, Quill and Parchment, and The Sunlight Press. “Waking to Winter”—in a slightly different version– will be part of the 2022 BRAG Ekphrasis VI exhibit at the Fairfield University Bookstore in downtown Fairfield, CT in April. Kindness in Winter is Sally’s new collection. Visit her website at http://www.sallynacker.com.