Though the plow has come, our drive is uncleared,
all the more forthright of the deer who have made themselves
familiar in these woods: hoof prints relieved in snow
like the hollow molds of a white rose. My boots leave
tracks, broad heels and toes that weave
with the feeding paths, and never more have I felt
the fact of my mammalian stock. Like an act of procreation
I am urged back to the shores of the Saint Croix,
a bone-deep dance between bear and den. Our house
stands low from above, as if huddled against the hillside
in escape of the winds that now break over me,
though they find no purchase in deep roots, unstripped
from this soil. Five generations have yet quickened
on this hill, and even as I mourn the memory of leaves
on these bare branches, I know that one day
I will exist for my children. They too will descend
these creaking steps and enter this house, welcomed
by the naked winter sunlight that paints the timber
window trims a wondrous gold. The double-panes will shed
kaleidoscopes across the room, casting strips of the colored heavens
onto my grandfather’s pottery. And though the river will lie
frozen beyond their reach, they will build a fire
and take their rest as I do now, letting the smoke climb high
above the trees and into the atmosphere, like an offering
to their numberless forebears.
