Geordie de Boer

Cold Snap

The alder above the arbor bends

with the weight of the snow on its limbs
until it looks like a tensed, drawn bow.

It flings its burden across the yard
as it whips upright unbroken,
while the poor pine pressing its branches

tightly to its trunk loses two limbs
to the heavy load on its shoulders.
The last time we met, my embrace

put your bones at risk of breaking.
Bones can become brittle from not taking
love given, affirming it with grace.

Now, writing these words to you,
the lead in my pencil keeps breaking
making a sound like bones snapping in two.

About Geordie de Boer

Geordie de Boer rattles around rural Washington these days wrangling rhyme and wrestling rhythm. He's been published most recently by elimae, New Mexico Poetry Review, Offcourse, and Right Hand Pointing.