A Word in December

Think of that disenchantment, that sharp breaking
Out of the double darkness that we knew:
Was love the unspoken word renewed in waking,
The cold flame that we tasted, being two,

For in that abstract world, the day’s profusion,
The clear antinomies of fire and ice
Dwindled and blurred; sprang out no quick conclusion;
Yet as I worked, these images stayed precise:

Your laughter, and your warm hands; your breath, whitely
Curling against the frosted pane; the bare
Trees we saw in the white park, still as the air —

Some say winter’s the death of love. If so,
What in your voice, so strongly, yet so lightly
Touched me just now with a flame that burns like snow?