Lonely Romance

Wes longed for the winter,
when it was safe to shut oneself away.
He loved waking up and going to school
and coming home in the dark,
the privacy of walking along in a twilit street in the cold,
the lonely romance of winter sounds -
wind whisking at the bare tree branches,
dry leaves scudding along an unswept sidewalk,
the muffling that descends before a snowfall.

What he hated was the summer,
things that were bright and open and shadowless.
He hated waking up in the sunlight,
the skimpy clothes,
the endless hazy twilights
that somehow made you feel less than wholesome
if you wanted to crawl into bed with a book
while there was still a warm, pastel glow in the sky.

~ Jesse Browner,
Everything Happens Today