I Am the Courage and the Heat

By Lynda Mackey

The sky moves royally in winter

—a distant chorus

of heaven’s dominion—

at night parading promises

across all space

with stars and torches.

From down on earth a sleepy man

looks out and shivers,

then shuts his window upon visions,

content to peep at glory,

then retreat into a nest of sleep.

Wisps rise from houses,

the breath of tired fires

and apologies smoked up

from cautious candles

made of orthodox red wax.

Yet some men learn to say His name.

It goes up in their faulty prayers,

a lease of virtue to their timid lips,

of lightning to their frozen souls,

of love to halting hearts;

and all huddle

in the promise of millennial thaw

so generously made

to the planet where Christ bled.