The Owl

We have joined winter in her solitude,

drawing inward, like the woods,

where even the crows have gone mute.

The creek now has a frozen crust

that has yet to girdle the rocks

revealing, through the gaps,

a shiny, black vein,

gurgling like winter’s blood.

Last night, after stoking the woodstove,

you lay awake in the darkness, watching smoke

curl around the half-moon

and vanish into thin air.

Somewhere in the night was an owl

calling

Who,

Who-Who,

in lovely, lonely triplets,

that took one into silence

into doing less and less,

until becoming smoke and moon,

there was no one there at all.

-Lincolnville, ME 1/1/16