Inside And Outside Our Homes

Over the empty house, the voiceless snow breathed anonymity. "That's where I was born," he said. She could not see her father's face in the Celtic dark but felt the past wander slowly through his words.

The shadows caught his memories reaching out to touch her gently: shyly they asked for her caring....

Under his old stillness hung remembering she never dreamed.

Daughter, she stirred, yearning for light. Incongruously

a robin sang ... As if far off she heard her father laughing softly. Here the waiting winter drew all distance into nearness.

And then she saw what suddenly the religious night was telling her: not what was lost but what was real - what must be lived through listening, through dark redeemed. Memories, like dreams, turned young. The night came true.

She saw her father as a boy - pictured his living behind the stark Welsh walls.... Wordlessly now he takes her arm. The moon breaks through. Their lingering smiles now warm the years, inform the snow, inhabit the renewing homes....