Dormant Does Not Mean Idle

When the axis of this moving magma rock,

Our living, water-loving habitat,

Tilts a single slice away from Sol,

 We only feel this 23 degrees of motion

As the embers in the furnace grow faint and lose heat.

Being a humanimal, with the  X,Y  

Co-ordinates set to:  78, 42 – I terminate

Fully a quarter of my conscious, waking hours 

Beneath Winters’ leaden skies.

A necessary, yearly tax;

Paying for an abundance of: rolling hills, leafy trees, screaming blue skies, 
Crunchy apples, refreshing lakes, wine-making grapes.

And, every time this mighty rock does a full promenade, we are lucky enough to be embraced

By Sol in a 16hr long kiss. Flower petals fine tune their most attractive colors,

Annually anticipating that…one…exquisitelyendlessseemingday.

  

On my tilt-a-world, it isn’t so much that I mind the spinning,

But nausea frequently crawls up my esophagus in those grey, frozen months;

Impossibly void-of-bursting-greens.

Most of this sentence is served 

Shuffling around boarded up bunkers of re-enforced sheet-rock

And wrapping our selves in shrouds of plastic/rubber/nylon/poly-cotton/wool-blends.

Rigid containers, lids screwed on too tight. Tension brews another pot of dark-roast coffee

 And serves it with silent haste to Sterility.

However, all seeds come equipped with a pod that shelters from the blight of a bitter gale.

Mine is an artificial one – complete with an assortment

Of dancing, colored lights and various, hand-selected bonbons.

So, most of these violently shortened days,

I seek my fill with somewhat reckless abandon.

Mashing my closed fists against silicone buttons,

Sequences, codes, a whole workable lexicon –

Oh, the senselessly endless combination of symbols!

From a certain angle, that seems like enough

To keep me sluggishly distracted.

Eyes at half mast, biding my time…

My senses thaw as whatever small, veined, photosynthetic miracles

Rise to the surface

Their determined tendrils reaching away from the past,

But remaining rooted there.

How to explain?

Try not to see it as: choosing to be stuck, 
Psychologically fixed to a place,

But, rather – emerging with momentous inspiration.

Breaking through, shedding the shell and growing

Means leaving some of our parts behind

And finding ways to flourish in spite of the pain.

When Spring lives do reveal their presence,

Stretching and lengthening after a season’s sleep beneath icy, white sheets,

The significance of the Void,

The power drawn, the potential energy gained

In the midst of quiet absence, is realized.

Isolation has taught me that

Dormant does not mean idle.