I caught you with your pants down

frost white from medieval winds

crackling underfoot, ice - glass reflecting

and from knobbled ponds face up

the calm unblinking sky.

Photographed at a distance

small lockets of cold.

Your infinitesimally small response

a desperate winter's cry.

Dogs were sniffing at your face

perplexed by your scentless shell,

with stunted trees your fringes girt

pointing fingers at the hem.

Then marauding gulls in a plague of white

descended as to Bethlehem.