"FOR THE LISTENER, WHO LISTENS IN THE SNOW..."

Winter
H. L. Hix
from "The God of Window Screens and Honeysuckle"

Stubble rows, four matte, four shiny in morning sun,/
show the combine’s direction. What can be preserved/
must be preserved as some self other than its own./
Bent cattails mimic stubble in the frozen pond./
Suet nearly gone, chickadees cling upside down/
to the feeder. Above it, a hedgeapple wedged/
between branches since fall. Past that, changing direction/
at once, fast as mackerel, a thousand blackbirds./
Skaters on a pond, we fall into what we know,/
drown in disorienting light before we freeze./
In angled afternoon sun, the fence’s shadow/
caresses the snow’s contours like tight-fitting clothes./
Even when grass greens to re-enact spring, the snow/
will linger, longest in the shadows of houses.