Heat Equation

I. 
Some days, everything reminds me of you: 
The smell of fire, acrid and abrupt. The colour 
blue, the Monet print in my kitchen. March wind, 
the sound of footsteps, the angle of an umbrella. 
Biscotti dipped in tea, how it diminishes in my mouth. 
The spreading warmth of his hand on my back. 

II. 
Again I organize, reorder my papers, rewrite
my lists. Two minutes pass, another clockward glance.
Outside my head, stale July still rankles. No work
gets done. The buzz of the fluorescent bulb, the fly 
charging headlong into its promise of turbulence.
I lift the mug to my lips and burn my tongue. 

III.
The children, all scarves and snow pants, lumber 
to the bus stop, are taken away in a fit of exhaust. 
Frosted grass blades stand at bent attention. Your voice
is quick in the pale air; your touch belies your warm
blood. Impending snow silences November. 
I hesitate beneath our bulky blankets. 

IV. 
And then, the trees, knowing our Canadian summers 
are short, burst into green overnight. Colour moves 
into everything: your long gaze, my restless fingers, 
the May clouds suddenly waves of blazing white.
Red-winged blackbirds rise and surge as one.
The movement of our molecules equilibrates.

© Sneha Madhavan-Reese