Opossum out at mid-day
on the glare ice
wipes its snout with its paws.
It’s digging through the crust
to reach food we’ve pitched—
old barbecue sauce, rotten cabbage—
inserting its head
as if through the shell
of a great white egg…
OTHER POSTS IN THE SERIES
- January noon
- Primary sources
- Nuthatch
- Haustorial
- Walking the line
- Gospel
- Wildstyle
- Close to home
- Lay of the land
- Primary school
- Subnivean
- Secondary school
- Rabid
- Snow plow
- Breaking through
- Bark Ode
- Snowfall
- Pastoral
- Sledding
- Valentine’s Day dreams
- Rabbit
- Deep snow
- Head cold
- Snow follies
- Thaw
- Reanimation
- Old snow
- Clearing
- Burning the tissues
- Filmstrip
- How to tell the woodpeckers
- Opening
- Winterkill
- Winter sky, age 5
- March
- Downsizing
- Winter gardener
- Miner
- Vessels
- Grand jeté
- Threnody
- Evergreens
- Slush
- Out
- Snowmelt
- Emergence
- In place
- Cold Front
- The death of winter
- Salt
- Harbingers
- Wintergreen
- Evolution
- Camouflage
- Spruce grove
- Waiting to launch
- Tintype
- Terminology
- In good light
- Reach
- Old field
- Rain date
- Onion snow
- Rite of spring
- Searchers
- Migrants
- Camberwell Beauty
- Lotic
- Empty
- Walking onions
- Trailing arbutus
- Makeshift
- Risen
- Remnant
- Sleight-of-hand
I felt the weirdest tremble when I pushed a reluctant mare through a gate with all my might from behind, one hand on each of her hips, sort of like the way one kid shoves the other in line ahead of him. It was the icy snow that I felt in her bones. It could almost bear her weight and it collapsed in stages.
Beautiful image, Bill. Thanks.
Definitely inspired by your eggshell snow. I wanted to mention bruxing and biting down of a bit of eggshell that came with scrambled eggs might not be too dissimilar to the sensation I felt in my hand.