This First Winter

These trees have nothing green

to offer the swallow,

the purple martin, the hawk.

They’ve flown south in a huff,

leaving the chickadee and cardinal

to the coming cold,

their abandoned homes poised

on pointy branch fingers,

balanced loosely on bare limbs,

lingering reminders of loss.

Copper slivers of winter grass

slice through gold and rotting leaves,

reaching for a silver winter sun,

finding only dark and grey.

Broken fences guard empty fields,

crisscross rails keep nothing out,

let nothing alive in,

their splintered rails urge me onward.

A barn’s faded message forewarns -

still I haven’t moved forward.