"The Winter Hound"
A thin-ribbed maple shivers.
Its ragged limbs rattle against the chill.
A thin-lipped woman shudders.
Her buckling body trembles beneath her coat.
And the wind drags its nails like the leanest of hounds
and, with eyes as desperate as December,
hunts them both.
A thin-ribbed maple shivers.
Its ragged limbs rattle against the chill.
A thin-lipped woman shudders.
Her buckling body trembles beneath her coat.
And the wind drags its nails like the leanest of hounds
and, with eyes as desperate as December,
hunts them both.
* * *
A while back, I wrote about one poem in which I presented a few scenes, simply described, with not too much embellishment, and mentioned that I had another poem one that I thought set up its comparisons better. This is the other one. I'm not sure if I like how the language falls in the first two stanzas -- it lands with some pretty jarring thuds -- but darned if the image of that hound doesn't bring me back to those December days when the wind was just beating everything down.
A while back, I wrote about one poem in which I presented a few scenes, simply described, with not too much embellishment, and mentioned that I had another poem one that I thought set up its comparisons better. This is the other one. I'm not sure if I like how the language falls in the first two stanzas -- it lands with some pretty jarring thuds -- but darned if the image of that hound doesn't bring me back to those December days when the wind was just beating everything down.
Fantastic imagery and economy here. You make every word count.
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