Rockledge: Winter Trails

Rockledge: Winter Trails

A luster plays across the glaze

on crusts and bombes and parallel lines

from skis that glided past the pines

lolling in Earth’s lantern-rays.

While a red-tailed hawk wheels round, wild geese,

with jet-black heads and white chinstraps

and squawks and honks and vigorous flaps,

mount a wind that won’t release

the region from its spell, like vines

wrapped round the maples, oaks, and willows.

The rubescent sun, unobscured by billows,

reflecting off the trail that winds

around this tract of land, descends —

a precipitous and fiery dive.

You wonder if you will arrive

before this blustery evening ends,

when Venus starts to scintillate

and foxes leave their lairs to stalk

the voles; as hungry as the hawk,

they’ll hunt as in the primal state.

Although the dark will soon devour

the way, you linger — and you dally

through the stillness of this valley,

draped in winter’s fleeting hour.

(Originally appeared in In Quire)