First Weekend

That first weekend alone
I went through a box of tissues
Lying by the ticking baseboard heater
Staring out the arched windows
of my third floor attic apartment
The wind sucking at the rattling wood frames

And stirring fat snow flakes
To a frantic dervish
In the funnel of amber light
from the street lamps

It would have been easier
Just to let my tears
Soak into the carpet
That first weekend alone