What does it mean?

What does it mean
when it's ten degrees out
on a January night
in the city of Montreal
in the great white north?

What does it mean
to look out your balcony
at a cloud hanging low
like a mist or a fog
and it's raining softly
and it's warm on your face?

What does it mean
that the birds are still here
and the squirrels
who should be sleeping
are thin and wild
and the barren maple trees
are starting to bud?

What does it mean?

Simon Law
6 January 2007, 4:06.
Montréal, QC.