Dull black velvet slabs unrolled,
the stiff color of dead crows;
a straight razor. Into this dark expanse,
I have tried to slice out wings.
My design is less wing-like than spiked.
My arms will not float into snow angels.
I am weighted down and dragged
into heavy rhythms. Grim ticks
like a grandfather clock pendulum.
I hear the snow against glass, ticking
the minutes until it strikes.
The voice of the snow is a messy lace-maker.
It sews shifts with goopy seams, uneven fretting.
Strange stalactites dangle
like butchered birds. Songs blurred
until a sudden surge of dripping feathers.
A dirge of ripping doilies as mutant beaks peck;
tear ornate edges to shreds. An irregular flurry
of sodden white confetti. A loopy clanging in my head.
Then the snow globe residue sinks to the bottom again.
The voice of the snow is a glazed unveiling
of rotten limbs. Snowball the shape of a bad apple.
White cake gone stale, molding, growing spores.
The color at the core of me
I've begun to abhor as a wormy gray-green
like used gauze bandages. Rancid yet repackaged
in waxy wrapper. The gelid mouth bites through
white turrets and spangles them with crystalline red.
Choke or hypnotize the arrhythmic swaying head
of the diamondback dread. Heavy pendulum.
Used gauze wrapped around the bad apple
ticking betwixt my lips. The impy kiss;
the sudden drifts of chilblained devilkins.
Maggots in snow angel positions, hissing
gimpy gimpy gimpy. Pimping powdered sugar
upon tainted silver trays. Gingerbread babies scuttle away
like cockroaches shedding burnt skins. Fruit rinds
flinch as they are rimed with hoarfrost trim.
I am weighted down and dragged outside.
Hog-tied gingerbread bride to a morgue-cold slab.
My eyes will freeze into black currants
as I stare out from my gyring dome.
My small rondure of scant residue;
snow ticking against the glass. Waiting
for the enclosure to crack. Waiting
for my crow voice to thaw and seep its rusty glissade
onto the sliver platter of snow angels with blades
for wings. Unglaciate this thing. Unfreeze the eyelash lace.
Expose the inclement face of this dark expanse.
