Colorless Place, We Must Resist

Place matters in the grand scheme 

as we plan the rest of our short lives in

between careers, births, and death,

tracing the lines of worry and doubt on

faces that age like earthen masks, 

cracking and morphing into new forms 

that recall our parents and their familiar

tragedies and strategies in months that

begin with archaic, internalized letters,

fomenting lethargy and resilience like

the graying maples and elms, the wintry

oaks, the desolate brown topped spruce, 

as those seasons change and loss becomes

static reality in this Upper Peninsula, this

region of utmost cold, where the snow falls

and blankets the silent masses, ergo, a laugh,

a sound, an eruption of jubilant life in

resistance to the colors that drain,

clamorously calling out for meaning. 

Ha! Relentless ones! You are stuck here!

Lift up your choices and dig in!