July 1, 2013

July now, and not near dark, and I have to
shut the windows against the cold.  It's not right,
and I don't want to.  I want them open,
as I have kept leaving them, almost all this spell,
at least a little, though sometimes, and tonight for sure,
there seems so little chance against the deepening chill
that will leave me, again, insufficiently protected,
even under covers, from the shivering
to the bone, seizing me up, compromised,
bitter aching for days, perhaps even
to take sore ill, as folk do, and have done,
when the wicked dank danger
invades the very breath and grabs hold
such that you know in the viscera why
they used to talk of humors and vapors and the likes of bedeviling.
There's no doubt what's wise with the windows.
But I fight it.  I don't want to give up.
It matters to me terribly much, such as I can't say.
And even as I close them, and go out to meet people,
and come back to try to sleep in the still crisp hard air,
I cannot think of tomorrow.  I can only feel
how wrong; how cold; how unconsoled.