Plainfield, Vermont

      The trembling acres on those grounds
Were fit with trees as tall and tall
And swaying high from left to right
As far as I could see, they were.

      They lined the trails of whitest snow
That covered plains and hills atop
A frigid cold that seemed to pierce
The birds that nest so far and high.

      The coldest March I’ve ever seen
With branches stiff on highest trees
That threatened me with distant sounds 
Were ominous with every sway.

Pursuing October

In those days I’d sit

By the window sill

In the cold dark daytimes

Of Winter.

I’d hear the blinds in the kitchen

tapping,

Then a chill followed by unwelcome cold

Breeze, from those gray days.

It was not morbid.

I was younger, Reveling in possibilities.

My friends would call me in the

Evenings, and we’d be

Be 40 year misanthropes

In Manhattan bars.

I was in the mindset of returning

To that small, wooded college

upstate NY, as I took a personal leave.

A sea of papers covered my

Bedroom floor with sophomoric attempts

At a novel.

I didn’t mean to make those memories,

Such is the way of nostalgia.

I’d let the tap from the blinds on

the window Keep calling me. I’d light a

cigarette and smoke.

Meticulously in moms kitchen. Letting

My thoughts ruminate. Giving into short

circuitry.

I didn’t need the Spring to

Bring me to my senses. It was still cold

Out, when I arose from that state

And closed the window shut.