Where are my friends?

Snow, like dust, like ash, falls before Christmas in a blanket covering hardened ground that sleeps through winter.

A lot of death this year. I see friends reclined with heads against satiny interiors. The lids have closed and cemetery soil locks them in as the season freezes. Death has bundled them in its secret and I wonder what remains.

Unbound by time or breath or solidity are my friends. I imagine they still think and see. They add their little spark of energy to the air and life around us, quiet in the cold as snow settles.

Lily has her own alphabet of sounds, but does nothing more tonight than sigh or yawn here at my feet.