That night, I discovered the alligators’ snouts poking through the ice and icicles slicing the orange groves. That night, I herded the geese into the house and locked them in the bathroom with a tub full of tepid water; I led the lamb to the living room and piled hay in the corner. I tilted lamps towards the goldfish bowl and in the kitchen moved all the bread to the refrigerator because at least there it wouldn’t freeze. I was long past dandelion season and wondered if it would return with its salads and wines, its poultices to draw poison out of my wounds. I boiled a pot of coffee and circled the house from slowly running tap to slowly running tap, drip-drip-drip against the freeze. From the closet I hauled down afghans my mother had crocheted, covered my shoulders, resumed my rounds. The geese, the pipes, the goldfish, the lamb— they made it ’til morning, I remember that, and when I went back down to the water the snouts were gone and the holes in the ice were empty halos shining on nothing.