This winter is a bear
in my garden: it sharpens

its claws against the oak and snuffs
through topsoil to pry loose the hidden bulb.

I traced its path in window frost,
how the soft pad of its heel pressed me

like a child inside the womb
until the swift puncture of claw.

I breathed and watched the veil dissolve,
absence blooming from my mouth:

the steady exhale, no bulb
warming its blossom.