[the Writing of Kuypers][JanetKuypers.com][Bio][Poems][Prose]

leaving She walked over to the thermostat again. “It’s hot in here,” she said to him again, but the temperature still read a cool 68 degrees. He started complaining to her about something, like he did before, like he’d do again. She walked into the kitchen and started to splash some cold water on her face. “Could you get a can of sardines while you’re in there?”, he said to her. Without saying a word, she walked to the front door, picked her denim jacket off the brass coat rack, grabbed the keys hanging from the hook, and walked out the door. She walked a mile and a half in the cold before getting to the empty field. Late November brought the first snow, and bits of ice clung to the ground in the early December night. She walked out into the grass and leaves, and listened to them crack as she moved. The water she splashed onto her face before was now frozen. Her ears, her nose -- the skin on her hands and cheeks -- were turning red, then purple. The tops of her legs hurt from the cold. She walked to the center of the field. She sat down in the dirt. She smiled. She laughed. She watched the moisture from her breath freeze as soon as it left her lips. She hurt from the cold. And she laughed. Copyright Janet Kuypers. All rights reserved. No material may be reprinted without express permission.