caps the vernal pond it’s January
Author: Dave Bonta
I live in an Appalachian hollow in the Juniata watershed of central Pennsylvania, and spend a great deal of time walking in the woods. My books of poetry include FAILED STATE: HAIBUN, ICE MOUNTAIN: AN ELEGY, BREAKDOWN: BANJO POEMS, and ODES TO TOOLS.
jade plant leaves
glow their brightest in the low winter light
corrugated pipe
an ancient beach
on the sandstone ridge we still stoop for baubles
goldenrod stalks
where bees hummed in August sparkles on the snow
foggy woods
the sassafras follows a crooked route to the sky
a tree too tall to stay
shadows of six-inch weeds stripe the stump
in the spotlight’s glare
the dark sky dissolves into snowflakes
wheel half-submerged
in dry meadow grasses the old hayrake
bare quarry rock
just half a mile away already looks blue
old corncrib
kernels of sun on the bare steel
slow-moving stream
only a slight shimmy in the ferns’ reflections
