("Patience is the scar left behind when certain kinds of hope have burned away." Sean Stewart, Galveston)

Go snow-bathing in an open ruin of stones. How flakes hit the walls & the toppled one crouched upon out of the wind enough for swirling sparkles pale turquoise in sun.

Yes, that lucky light yet finds skin & promises of civilization erecting itself are what is left in this stony vestige when barbarity reigns.

Remember that vision, Gladiator, this rubble suggests when the dropped sword & shield reflects Distress beacons.

Meanwhile the cold has a dryness which cleans wounds back to patient scars for the helmet as pillow & the blankets of taken-off armor.

To pull them round is to become a shepherd again, sweat-glowing in some Berber country of everlasting Summer. Beneath that noon continues a radiant warmth where one phoenix calls to its other forms out of ash.

Home is those echoes, the answering voices of loved ones back from battles as though never lost to what violence technology invented at the hands of man.

No, such holy land's blood stays put in its veins for eons on, & snow is snow only falling on lashes & crystals melting on tongues, a miraculous oasis in the desert Jerusalem, the covenant gold.