Plummer’s Hollow

Fast-moving windows of blue in a yellow sky. The trees creak as they sway—it’s 5°F. A good day for walking, a bad day for standing still.

Freezing rain on new slush—a metallic sound. In the driveway, the herringbone patterns of ATV tracks from last night’s pair of trespassers.

When I first come out, the yard is a giant gyre of birds. They soon segregate themselves: sparrows to the meadow, finches into the birches.

Mid-morning, and the snow on the roof has sprouted tendrils of ice reaching for the ground. They drip; they sway in the breeze; they let go.

Rain. The snow’s almost gone, but the forest floor has been altered: no longer scruffy and mammalian, but sleek as a red-backed salamander.