A Weeping Willow in Winter

What does this blanket of ice cover
while the heat of the sun still melts it away
while its nature is to be cold and unforgiving?
What bodies lie under at the end of the day?

It’s not the ones who have never longed
to be merely needed by another.
But the ones whose isolation follows them
like a dog without an owner— 
living off scraps and the fleeting affection
from those who are brave enough to come near. 
And the ones whom everyone has forgotten
as if they have never owned a name.
Those are the bodies that lie under
at the end of the day.

I won’t be able to offer you comfort
the way these bringers of heat do.
I don’t own the warmth of the sun
the way these keepers of light do.
My gift is to lay you under at the end of the day.

My warmth is in the layers of an ice-blanket.
The protection of my collected weight.
Like armor, built by the busy yet
strategic falling of snow
on the tensionless arms of a weeping willow.
This is how I build a safe haven
for the nameless and forgotten. Under
the shelter of a weeping willow in winter.
For all bodies who come to lie under at the end of the day.