It’s a moment

when ice no longer cuts

but cradles

when each shiver is swallowed whole

and my body learns another lie.

I slip below

not into warmth

but into some distant memory of it

a trick of sensation

that holds me still

a paradox in liquid form.

It’s not comfort

more an absence of refusal

to sense

what once rejected my skin

now welcomes it

as if we are kin

knows what it’s like

to forget its edges.

This is how the freezing goes

not sudden

nor sharp

but soft

the way a flame’s last breath

feels cold

before the dark

crowds in.

You tell yourself

this is peace

and for a dangerous moment

it almost is.