Remedy for Being Cold

winter clam flats,
lubec, maine

Remedy for Being Cold

 

She sits in the timestorm time’s turned into,

shinedying in her easy chair.

 

Love is there:

                                    Christian Wiman

                                    Rust

 

When the hats arrived,

and the scarves,

all the way from Ireland

the ardent nigh smell of

the lamb, of the ewe,

her fleece, and her fleece,

 

speaks with a close

aroma, though not only

that, & not aroma alone

though that is what I

noticed.  And ardent

is probably wrong,

 

too ambitious a word

but I was caught off

guard & my nostrils

stopped & the cauldron

of sheep seemed immediate

if more than three

 

thousand miles…but

I tell you I wanted to fall

back on that air of salving

emollient & be washed

not in water but in the lanolin

of mother, to be

 

embedded into the wool

before it was lifted from her

skin, all burdock & fold-clay

caked, I wanted that,

and thought if I had it

I’d never again be cold.

water over, water
paused