Fire and Ice in February

                                        

                                                                                                     

                                                                                                       - with appreciation to Mr. Frost

There was a fine freezing mist in the air

and the feet from my bed were quite bare.

I saw an ice crystal blanket out on the ground.

I was surely old enough to come in out of the rain

and I knew without a doubt that it was damned cold.

That last, at least, I didn’t have to be told.

It certainly wasn’t summer

and I clearly wasn’t slumbering,

although it was at least three or four

o’clock in the morning.

And so without good sense,

I quietly stepped out the back door

in my twinkle-toed bed-warmed bare feet.

As it turned out, they were liars.

Ice doesn’t burn like fire,

Ice burns like ice.

Ice sears your skin

and makes your heart pound.

And by then I had completely lost the rhyme

and I plainly had no reason remaining.

My beating heart had suddenly caught fire.

And so like a blazing comet I sped

with my bathrobe tails flying behind.

I raced around the center of my universe –

that is to say my house - just the one time.

And then, hurriedly, I hurried back to my

cozy warm bed.

This much might be true:

you die only once

and so you might as well live

as if this was your first time.

Fire burns hot like a burning fire.

But sprinting across thin ice

just might suffice.