Winter is a Time for Healing (a poem)

Winter is a time for healing.
Cold, gray mornings and a pallid moon hangs in the sky.
Bundled up to protect my heart.
My heart is a fireplace, radiating from the center of my chest.
My lover comes close, we warm ourselves.

Winter is a time for healing.
Birds migrate south, leaving us to think of what we’ve done and how we can make the world a better place.
We take inventory of our souls.
Nature retreats, but it’s only regenerating.
Without winter, there’s no spring or summer.
We snuggle into the season with our lovers, and I clasp my rosary as I pray to the God I want so desperately to believe in.

Winter is a time for believing.
In the chilly darkness of early evening, I feel the ground beneath me, and I imagine myself connected to everyone and everything.

Help me to believe, I tell my God.
Help me to believe, I tell my lover.
Help me to believe in the power of winter.
Help me to believe in the goodness that’s there.
Help me to believe in winter, the time for healing.

(Photo by Rodion Kutsaev on Unsplash)