Winter

           WINTER

I met her at the half-turn of the stair

where shadows meet,

and caught the fullness of her breath

before she was aware.

Sculpted to stillness in the window-light

she stood, and folds

of frosted dawn falling about her brittle form

covered her quite.

I moved, she fled, and on the closing pane,

drifting her hand,

printed curling fronds of ice,

fern chrystalline.

I met her at the half-turn of the stair

this winter-maid, with snowflakes in her hair.

                     Mary McKeone rscj