Icequake from the asteroid hit on Japan. The sky blotted out by dust; snow blackened; crevasses impassable. Communications dead for the past six months.

We celebrate Christmas: dinner is protein biscuits crumbled in water and our remaining brandy. The brandy warms us; later, the cold will numb us to sleep.

Mantz Yorke is a former science teacher and researcher living in Manchester, England. His poems and prose have appeared in print magazines, anthologies, and e-magazines in the UK, Ireland, The Netherlands, Israel, Canada, the US, Australia, and Hong Kong. His poetry collection Voyager is published by Dempsey & Windle.