We are on a different planet now,

uncounted light years away from the annihilating exhaustion

of Cold Grey Flatland and the annual

forced migration indoors to face

the Season of Darkness

and the regime of dreary incarceration

amidst the sleeping, barren trees.

We know honest sweat,

and Gauguin skies,

and the joyous feel of dirt in our hands

instead.

And as we turn our faces toward a brazen sun

and land that has never known anything except inexorable

life,

we realize that if our long-ago births

gave us nothing more than the chance

to plant flowers

in this gently smiling place

on the first day of "winter",

then we are thankful for them

for that alone.