Winter Solstice

Drive the narrow road
past cold
misty vineyards;

peer carefully
through pulsing wipers,
past jeweled beads
smeared to curving trails.

Look
into the glaring eye
of traffic.

Swinging around
tight bends
cars pass you,
throwing
sheets
of driving
rain.

Hold tightly to your wheel!
Keep your lane.
Do not descend
into the flooded gutter;

for on the western edge
in darkly glowing cobalt
the declining sun,
leans towards longer southern days.

Night
has begun,

the longest night
of the year.

(19 December 2010)