In 1936 it got wet-cold during lambing and the old man brought in a twin
the ewe wouldn’t take, carried it into the basement (dirt floor, smells of
dry rot and potatoes) and he lay down, unbuttoned coat and shirt and pulled
the unwashed long johns away from his chest – so long since he’d laundered
himself the hair had grown clean through the cloth – and he put that lamb
in against his belly, buttoned everything back over, went to sleep. Well –
that one lived.

This morning, high overcast, windless, single digits: spring – too early,
always too early for anything being born – drifts everywhere, flattening
the roll of slight hill and gully, the uneven remnants of sage, shattered grasses.
Two minutes walking, the ewes for once bunched up near the junipers, it was
so fast, between one step and another, knock-over gale, snow you couldn't
see through, breathe through, we knew – keep moving or drift in,
stumble and die – nothing visible except the lambs,
the blessed bloody lambs, the pink tongues of their mothers.
                        

All day clouds seal the sky,
sun a faint pale circle,
the world's sounds baffled,
muffled – even the close noise
of birds seems distant.

I think of my friend mixing
her water paints, what she might
tell me – that grey
is never pure, never just one
color – even Payne's from a tube,
a blend of pigments.

For heavens edging into ebony,
diluted Ivory Black is warm,
transparent; watered
Lamp Black, opaque and cool.

But shadow shades, neutrals,
darks, any fogged or smoky thing –
all soft implosions of reflective
hue, all undertones of red, green,
blue, of yellow, purple, brown.

Mix earth and air, earth and water:
Raw Umber with Cobalt,
Raw Sienna with Ultramarine,
Transparent Brown Oxide
and Cerulean; for storm light,
a wash of Violet, Umber,
Phthalo Green.

Don't forget, she'd tell me,
in early spring the clouds are faded
as the hides of winter-worn horses,
and sky has no color –
it's all mirror, a play
of what light carries back to it
from the broken things
of this world.