In the years when winter snow piled up
along the edges of the streets, beneath the windows
on the lee side of the hedge,
I did my homework at a desk my father built,
set in the corner of my bedroom, facing west.
Which was my choice, I think. The second desk,
I know it was. And once I moved out, the apartments
with the bad floors and the crazy plumbing,
the wallpaper I was always steaming off, I’d take 
the place because it had a workspace
that did not face east.

Those cold bright years.
How long I spent, trying to die.

Such injustice. When every morning
it’s spring again. Every morning
the light melts the snow –
before books, before desks, before windows,
before pain, before amazement.