to my faraway lover in winter   Between us: banshee North Atlantic gales maddened with March, the sea's relentless claims, the obstinate fact of mountains, the rack of plains; just witnessing the world, the sun glows pale.   This is our season of abstinence, the heart gnaws on stricture, abstraction, unlikelihood; the heart rehearses reasons why not, it would cite elemental certitudes, as old as dirt and rain.                     But all the same: fear is easy, faith is hard; the dust-grey monks of doubt mutter counsel: for every cure -- disease; for every heaven -- hell, and no way out. . . .   Why do we listen? Whatever is, is true, as April cycles blithely into view.     © Michael Fleming Casper, Wyoming March 1985