In "Calgary 2 a.m.," Christopher Wiseman begins with winter and ends with summer. The seasons, however, have not changed. The temperature is still twenty degrees below zero, and it is still the middle of the night. The contrast is between the freezing, dismal winter outside and what is happening both inside the poet's house and family and within the poet himself.

The title of the poem reinforces the imagery at the beginning. The name "Calgary" comes from the Old Norse words for "cold garden." The city is set in the midst of a bleak and icy landscape, and at 2 a.m., it will be at its coldest and darkest. The poet depicts a dismal environment in which it has already been winter "for five long months" and there are no signs of new life emerging. The theme of the poem appears at first to be the deadness and desolation of a long winter. Then, however, the poet points out the "wild blueness" of the moonlight shining into his house. He counts his blessings: his children, his wife, his friends, and the occasional poem.

The conflict in the poem, therefore, is between summer and winter, cold and warmth. Though winter appears to dominate the landscape entirely, people can create their own summer in homes and communities and in themselves. This is the principal idea expressed in the poem.