Get Your Premium Membership

In the Bleak Midwinter

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan, Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone; Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow, In the bleak midwinter, long ago. - Excerpt from A Christmas Carol by Christina Rossetti *** My mirror-face is pinched pallid as, colourlessly, I go over and over his last journey, and shudder like a train on a track. His last tracks...tracks in the snow...train tracks. Tear-tracks dampen my ashen cheeks, but tears, though summer-warm, don't thaw the bone-chill of alone. his snowflake letter cold on an empty car seat - no explanation Just sorry and people don't always understand I only hope you can and goodbye. I took to my bed as the ripped days bled, pulled the duvet up over my head, shaken by a blizzard of dread. Fingers in ears, didn't want to hear about last movements, CCTV footage, forensics. My words fell snow-silent and, as people have pointed out to me since, now I only speak through poetry's voice, its mediumistic mouth. I'm reading a book Coping With Suicide, well, I'm trying to read. But each page is a snowdrift muffling my mind; each word is a curled black whorl of iron-hard earth. I've stopped counting the days and nights, they've merged into a blizzard blur of winter-white. And the hoarded condolence cards all cry winter in snowflake whites and star silvers: In Deepest Sympathy ivory-traced, With Sympathy silver-etched. Who would have thought grief had so many shades of winter? That death had a colour? Whilst others died with a heart attack's red squeeze or cancer's black rampage, he died with suicide's expanding white, its barren blank. Poking food around my plate, staring sickly-numb, dumb, at the mounded joyful orange of carrots, the happy yellow smiles of corncobs. Ashen faces in sifting ashy light; voices ermine-soft in empathy. friends coax-feeding me at a table set for one - his chair is empty Sleeping with his photograph, well, feigning sleep, through each silent night. Nothing holy in loss and lonely, just a hole blown through the heart. Remembering: winter woodland walks hand in hand, plans we made, foundations laid. Frost-framed photos, snapshot days: a memory mural. Each shared moment freezing to a cold grief-pearl. Blanched branches window-tapping, and I'm thinking it's him. filigree window vista of Christmases past... heart-held memories

Copyright © | Year Posted 2024




Post Comments

Poetrysoup is an environment of encouragement and growth so only provide specific positive comments that indicate what you appreciate about the poem. Negative comments will result your account being banned.

Please Login to post a comment

Date: 3/2/2025 7:55:00 AM
Dear Charlotte: After recently losing my husband, I truly understand the emotional writing from the depth of your soul. Thank you for bringing words of deep expression to me. Your gifted words touch my soul.
Login to Reply
Date: 1/5/2025 7:30:00 PM
Wow. This is so beautifully sad and tragic. I can't see if it is based on a true story or for a contest, but it seems so heartfelt. A fave for me
Login to Reply
Date: 12/19/2024 5:50:00 AM
Dear Charlotte, what a deeply moving poem. Your artistry captures the raw, unrelenting weight of grief with stunning poignancy. I really felt the imagery you’ve crafted—winter’s stark cold, the suffocating white of loss, and the contrast of bright, joyful colors against a gray, numbed existence is haunting and beautifully evocative. May You Be Blessed in All Ways, Daniel
Login to Reply
Date: 12/16/2024 5:20:00 PM
Dear Charlotte, your soul-laid-painfully bare poem captivates my imagination and releases emotions I was unaware were there. I revel in your artistic use of language, how your word choices mold into potent imageries of heartrending emotions, sights, sounds and memories. Your last line "Blanched branches window-tapping, and I'm thinking it's him" was crushing. Congratulations for your success in Tom's contest. I'm honored the share the podium with you. Warmest wishes my poet friend.. ~Susan
Login to Reply
Date: 12/15/2024 7:13:00 PM
"snowflake letter", empty chair... grand symbolisations. Congratulations!
Login to Reply
Date: 12/15/2024 10:33:00 AM
Hey, look at you placing in a Tom Woody contest! Of course, who am I? Nobody. Nonetheless we teared up with you over the terrible loss and haunted memories that bring mixed feelings. Yes, food, friends, a sunny day... all mean little or nothing when one is depressed. Wonderful write
Login to Reply
Woody Avatar
Tom Woody
Date: 12/16/2024 5:23:00 PM
No need to thank me. You're an excellent poet. Our styles are entirely different but there's room for all
Date: 12/14/2024 3:51:00 PM
Woah. This is a surprise to me, how gifted of a write it is. You really have heart - and I am so sorry for your loss. May you find depths in Christmas this year- out of the hole. Hugs.
Login to Reply
Date: 12/12/2024 5:48:00 AM
Christmas probably highlights the worst memories of suicide. You can see why people just shut themselves away. There's probably a thousand reasons why people take their own lives, and only they know it. The ones left behind. That's the real torture.
Login to Reply
Date: 12/11/2024 11:19:00 AM
I read your poem/transcendent experience yesterday, pondered, and reflected. It was like looking in a mirror and seeing a ghost from the past. Today I gathered the courage to wish you well and write. In my situation I carried the weight of guilt, like was I the one to blame for his death.I was thorned/torn, seemingly, for the last 16 years,and I continue to pay for his sins.By writing today I hope I help one person. Charlotte the little I know of you, I truly wish you better days/weather ahead.
Login to Reply
Parker Avatar
Arlo Parker
Date: 12/11/2024 4:29:00 PM
This is what PS does best, CP/CP. Looking in, reaching out. :o))
Date: 12/10/2024 9:58:00 AM
Such a tour de force expressing suicide aftermath and love before, and always. The images stark, blatant, new-forged, pain draining. This is a poem one must read line by line a second, third, and fourth time. Then ponder what could be with loss as the ultimate theme of one's life. Exhausting.
Login to Reply

Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry