You are the kindest creature! Cradled
you will not let me see the eye
that's skipped a season, frosting.

All my dreams are clogged there, dull
dish of milk. The sallow moon locked
in cycle, dead ash of numbers.

All my wishes whisper to a fizzle
you hear as animal sound. Indistinguishable.
"Hope" as foreign to you as "death."

One early ripening. Alert to life
you purr, part of you gone to winter.