The Doldrums of March

The day is dull, almost shadowless. I am alone; shadow would have given me comfort. Pages of ancient tomes, full of must, call me; there is always comfort here. I light lamps damning the florescent pall. When bathed in the flicker florescent lit walls become blue-tinged harbingers of death. I worship beneath the shadow-casting gold of incandescence. The 300-watt glow of my love-gifted torchiere soothes me. I place thin-skinned cheek on chill of plaster wall, wishing to submerge myself in shadow, but I do not succumb. Ah, the page that calls, the keys which click when pen has gone unfound, are all I have. Why leave, my heart cries out, there is only the cold of the grave, none to mourn your passing. Only the sterile page, the plaster walls, the shadowed-stage? No, I argue with my weary self, put aside this Keats-like gloom poverty and tombs, and rise! The sun will shine at winter's end to daffodils. First Published Inwood Indiana February 2014