One year melts into another
and while every snowflake is unique
once it falls
it blends into the whole
much like the tombstones that rise on the hill
in the chill of deep winter
it is no longer the individual, but the collective
that blankets the earth
in the quiet beauty
of silenced despair.
falling snowflakes are fractals
in winter’s fragmentation
patterns that repeat themselves
in nature
not unlike us.
naively
I once believed the world was moving forward
daring to ignore
the centrifugal force of its rotational pull
now I know
we just spin round and round.
a singular cello can be haunting and resonant
but when played with an orchestra, resplendent
we need one another to survive.
The grieving orca, Tahlequa
carried her dead calf for seventeen days
without regard for her own livelihood
in the once salmon rich waters of Puget Sound
though energy drained, she protected him
from wind and waves, comforted
only by her tightly knit pod who mourned
by her side.
This Christmas, she gave birth again
but by the New Year, her new calf was gone.
on the brink of extinction
she clings to this lifeless calf still
much as we
still cling to hope
on the brink of extinction
our world now so deeply
fractured
in this deep, deep, deep
fragmented winter.
—
Chris Baral spent her early childhood in the Bronx before moving to the New Jersey suburbs. As the child of two librarians, she credits her mother for gifting her with her lifelong love of words. After graduating from Rutgers College, she spent many years working first within the art world and then in the wine business in Northern California, where she and her husband, Jerry (for whom there are no words) raised their son before moving to the Berkshires several years ago. She has written poetry for as long as she can remember.
