Creek Skating

In the pasture behind the barn 
where workhorse colts frolic all summer long, 
the creek, once the broth of stones, freezes over, 
greens and blues of creek bed and cottonwood 
muted in meandering. 

All rivering stills 
for the crisp cut of metal blades 
on the ice-path 
like fingernails scraping 
against frosted farmhouse windows. 

Upon a curved tablet of snow and ice 
our silver runners scrape and flow 
like cursive. They skip 
and glide, then claw a halt, 
fragments of ice ascending in the cold. 

What is it that draws us, our feet 
huddled into too-small skates 
we want never to outgrow, 
wild in our breasts with sub-zero air 
that hurts down through our saw-blade toes? 

The creek opens a window in our body house 
to let birds fly free. We are carving our names 
on white stone in arcs, curves, figure eights, 
racing against spring, another season of growth 
liquefying our souls.