Waking Tomorrow

Waking in this bed, you stir beyond my reach;
no arm can span the frozen sheet
that gapes between us; waking each to each
we lie alone and hear the ice retreat.

Your glacial shoulder, your permafrost skin
is bitter wasteland. Habitual Winter numbs
our waking; these barren days of pallid suns
solidify the freezing seas that churn within.

A thousand miles away you check the time.
Another ice-age day resumes. I turn to sleep
and warm my Arctic dreams with ancient sunshine:
the light of fiery summers we failed to keep.