Midwinter Song
Jonathan B. Aibel
Shadows lobtail.
Certain death
in the flukes
in my bones.
Steady. Steady.
Rattle-dance thoughts,
I never sleep but rouse
coughing.
It's bitter out.
The house is quiet
but for the whistle.
Summer is a legend
mice tell each other
gathered in holes
after they have finished
hunting crumbs.
Jonathan B. Aibel is a poet who spends his days wrestling software to the ground as an engineer specializing in quality and testing. His poems have been published, or will soon appear, in Rogue Agent, Main Street Rag, Constellations, Nixes Mate, Lily Poetry Review, and elsewhere. He has studied with Lucie Brock-Broido, David Ferry and Barbara Helfgott Hyett. Jonathan lives in Concord, MA with his family.