KILLING FROST

I walked outside early this morning to see our first killing frost. The thistle was weighted with crystals and drooped in willing defeat. The grass protested under my shoe, the shards of ice unable to hold me. A killing frost helps put the natural world to a gentle rest to prepare for warm rebirth.

A KILLING FROST

by Jay Parini

Beside the pond in late November,

I'm alone again

as apples drop in chilly woods

and crows pull tendons like new rubber

from a roadkill mass.

Ice begins to knit along the ground,

a bandage on the summer's wounds.

I touch the plait

of straw and leafmold, lingering to smell

the sweet cold crust.

An early moon is lost

in sheer reflection,

wandering, aloof and thinly clad,

its eye a squint of expectation.

I know that way,

this looking for a place to land

where nothing gives,

these boundaries of frost and bone.