A Hush of Winter

By Cliff Lake

 A Hush of Winter

 

The melancholy of the winterscape is told in quietude:

The bird does not sing,

But stands puffed on the branch,

Head huddled in feather.

Should he fly,

His wingbeat is stark,

Breaking a silence

Underscored by the creak of the branch just left.

A soft sigh may play,

A breeze stirring nothing,

Detritus weighed down by frozen snow.

Such winds do not curtail the silence,

But accentuate it:

The carried voice of a dog left outside too long.

Traffic is sparse for no better reason

Than to remain inside,

Shunning the stillness,

That is somehow only partly dispelled

By the carnival barkers shouting from TV.

Now mothers hush their children,

The gray quiescence

Takes offense at the shrill merriment,

Books and crayons are dispensed,

Board games thrust into unwilling hands.

The wait then is for the new snow,

Then will lively gangs of youth

Shout against the white empty.

But today only the lone wingbeat sounds,

A flutter of noise fading

And dusk takes the world.

 

Cliff Lake 1/14/2023

Copyright © Clifford Lake

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