Nothing Compares to a Real Holiday

(After TUI’s ‘Nothing compares to a real holiday,’ 2020)

The snow has lain three days
the street is frozen
roofs luminous
in a pre-dawn light
sky already faded
from deep, star-sprinkled
black to this stern
uncompromising blue

I have a poem to write
something about
overheard conversations
or advertising slogans

But my imagination
is no match
for the beauty
of this moment
this stillness before
the press of day
this morning
open-armed and sleepy
cars creeping crackling
over ice

Nigel Currie lives in North Yorkshire with his wife, two daughters, and cocker spaniel. He has been published in Dark Tales Magazine and the Pine Cone Review, and is currently studying for an MA in Creative Writing at the Open University.