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| Unknown |
Bell
This newness of snow. This boot-ringing
as the snow warms in the sun to crush. These holes
we wind around the witnessing pines. This
violation of white. This slowness of moose.
This counting of steps. This counting of scars
in the bark: the wary burl bulging low
on the trunk, the black scratchings left
by a bear learning to climb. This counting
of sleeps between this country and the next country
we call home. These branches shucking off
the statuesque in avalanches of needles and ice.
This progress, as in the wind-scalloped snow meadow
pretending to be moon. This love that sets us scrambling
over the map's last ridge, our red hoods bright
in shrunken sky. This metallic weather in which we
are the ore. This alder. These crimson-tipped willows
reverberating next to a river of turquoise ice. This
following the deep tracks of one coyote stepping
where another has stepped. This wilderness
that we trespass, burning like berries in the juniper
and becoming the air in the belfry.
Cecily Parks
It's as if we are walking with the speaker, as if she is pointing out each thing to us, "This, this..." as if in proof of something spoken of before the poem began. Almost as if she is taking us on the trail of something, the signs, as it were - clues.
And what do they lead to or from?
