Flying over frozen water in winter,
the sky, the sea, the land all gray,
and the waves at the shore,
not yet hard, still churning.
White birds with necks like thin vases
swoop down along the spray,
dipping in and out like rain,
shuddering, bodies breaking
surf. There is something about
water just before the freeze,
about elegant birds bearing lightly
along clouded peaks of sea;
something about feeling everything,
the moment of touching,
white heat rising in a body,
breaking without melt.
the sky, the sea, the land all gray,
and the waves at the shore,
not yet hard, still churning.
White birds with necks like thin vases
swoop down along the spray,
dipping in and out like rain,
shuddering, bodies breaking
surf. There is something about
water just before the freeze,
about elegant birds bearing lightly
along clouded peaks of sea;
something about feeling everything,
the moment of touching,
white heat rising in a body,
breaking without melt.