January

Of course it's to be expected:

the dim light and early dark

and the endless days of rain.

And if the week of brutal cold 

wasn't what you signed up for,

well, it's what you got,

so might as well make the best of it.

Other people got blizzards,

and friends have flooded basements

or days without power

or lost everything to wind-whipped 

wildfire. Of course, there's nothing

less comforting than the notion

that others have it worse.

Misery doesn't love company, 

it just spreads like an oil slick

across the dull land, and we

have moved on from terror

to a cranky ennui. But one day

last week the clouds lifted,

and there was the mountain, shining

in all its snow-clad glory.

My breath caught to remember

that what I see is not 

the sum of what is there.

--Lynn Ungar