back field

fog drifts through branches rigid with ice

beside the oak

with a huge round hole an uncanny silence

a single stalk of grass pointing toward town

a thousand sections of sky & one yellow leaf

a boil on the black birch looks good enough to lick

the oak log’s colors are so bright I have to touch

on each numbered leaf in the study group

the 200-year-old white oak isn’t stirring

collects enough leaves to make its own woods

alive with color in between the cracks

trapped in the cross-hatch foliage new blue ice

caps the vernal pond it’s January