Diciembre came today. 

Each new winter holds hope. 

Fate always brings it in a warm embrace, 

gives it away in a winter storm.  

How long does a Diciembre last then? 

 

I want to heat the sand. Make it stay.  

Jeffrey, mi nuevo hermano, his 

kidnapped innocence still intact, 

light yellow skin simply wrapped in a warm white blanket, 

my memory drops sand on our first Diciembre.  

 

Northern winter winds whisper warnings we don't want to hear. 

Our fear trusts 

painful hope in this trojan horse of winter.  

Questions about our father, about our life, about our future 

repeat words found in a storm. 

 

Sweetly wrapped in holiday gore, 

our new December gifts us beers, brawls, pitch black nightmares- 

Unaware of the previous gifts being destroyed by 

violent memories  

with familiar grips on our healing soul.  

 

Xanax is a gift that takes.  

Yellow was replaced by absence. I am left 

zombie-like in an irreversible winter storm, 

away from now.  

 

Bruising Christmas carols and bone-breaking jingle bells. I want it all 

changed into a familiar 

Diciembre.