It can be hard to see the gift
if the country you’re in is North.

It can be hard to see the gift
if cold walled you within a fort
Of slouching and huddling
And turning towards ‘in’
To seek refuge from ‘out’
And bow low in chagrin.
It can be hard to see the gift
When love is all around,
But stretched far into your distance
Untouched – lost, not found
In chocolate or roses
That drug stores now sell,
Trying to say ‘alone’
Is equally as swell.

It can be hard to see the gift
If your faith calls you to walk
Toward the end before beginning.
Marching forth begins to balk
at commitment to let go,
at commitment to commit,
at the stretch of 40 days
Before the gift can remit.

It can be hard to see the gift,
But I can sense it in the air.
I can see it in the evening slant
Of light that wasn’t there.
‘February’s’ clunky with
a mystery in the ‘r’.
Is it shadowing a rodent
as the sun blinks from afar?
The gift we find in February
may press for searching long
to find the glow, what’s precious
in the shivering, wintry song.

If your find the gift in February
Do fan the spark of longing
to erect your self
and dissect the wall
To re-enter the world of belonging.

Susan Ceely Phillips