I miss the sidewalks covered in mounds
of slick, clear, frost-spotted ice.
When every spout on the horizon
leaks a steam that hizzles toward the sky,
one places himself from one cocoon to the next,
shielding his tender flesh from the elements.
If one is wrapped well enough, and can venture
into the darkness on the coldest of nights,
his thoughts will be broken only by the groaning
and crunching of hardened snow beneath his feet,
and his comfort invaded only by the overlooked
crevices in his outer protection. There are times
when one is reluctant to even inhale, for the bitter air
is unsuitable for lungs, and the pads
of one’s shoes will soon succumb to the soil
upon which he walks, which is frozen
to such a degree that it seeks out warmth
in the things that come into contact with it.

I miss the abrupt changes in season
from lifeless, gray Winter into Spring,
where the smells of abundance peek
their furry heads out from holes, are squeezed
from the thawing ends of buds, and one is elated
at the mild climate and seemingly limitless
potential of a day. Then Spring evolves into Summer,
where one can roll on the floor, indoors or out,
and feel completely liberated to allow that
which lives out of his home, in. Summer then sees
grayer, turbulent days, in which he lowers
his head when walking into the wind. The street
is blown over with leaves, first red and orange,
then brown. They collect in piles under curbed cars,
and one turns into himself and is given time to introspect
on the elements which make up his life.

I miss these changes, these checkpoints of one’s
place in the year. I miss them because they do not occur
here. One’s week slips by like a movie he has slept through,
and he is left with no conscious groupings of time
that can be looked to in memory, and reflected upon.
Here there is no arresting smells that one discovers
after they have been hiding frozen for nearly a year,
smells that remind him of people he once new,
and places that seemed as if they would be frequented
until the end of his life. This is the dilemma
of a neutral climate, one that is mild for the majority
of the year. Conceptually, a place which sees no extreme
change in weather seems more conducive to joy.
But one may find in time, that once the thrill of sunny skies
wears off, one is left feeling disconnected from nature,
which makes itself known even in an urban environment,
if it is in a constant change of form and intensity.
If we wish to be in always in a state of self invesitgation
and rebirth, which, if not a part of, one’s ambitions might
atrophy, causing him to forget the small joys and curiosities
in nature, then we must submit ourselves to be commanded-
to a degree- by the seemingly mundane effects of changing seasons.