Long Winter

It is spring, and the snow falls,
like it has fallen every day since November.

I eat my gruel cooked over a wood fire.
Every day I split the wood.

Where is my shirt of camel's hair,
the ancient beads I tell?

But I am comfortable and warm,
writing on my computer
made of worried stone.

The sun is filtered
through frozen clouds.

Above them,
Solar flares send killing rays
they say, and solar storms
are flaring now.

Oil fields burn with back smoke.
Tomahawk missiles whistle like arrows,
the earth quakes,
for a moment, the sea
casually abandons restraint
and washes our cities away.

The overcast and falling snow
are my armor.
My prayers to you
slice right through them.