Lounging on the Ice Mattress

A recent poem by Crystallyn goes like this:

The Eyes Begin to Draw Stars

They told me about it, their voices calm,
music low; it was snowing outside.
I didn't hear them.
I was watching the way the water fell--
a frozen shower of winter stars,
layering sparkles of white on
the ice-topped canal.
I thought it was like a fluffy blanket--
maybe I could crawl under and curl
up, fishes dreaming beneath my
mattress of ice, the sound of
duck wings whirring me to sleep.

I like this poem a lot. I like the image of the mattress of ice, and reading such a wintry poem on a warm Spring day like this is the next best thing to air conditioning. I can imagine the poem also working without the "I didn't hear them" line, though omitting it might change the emphasis a bit.