The Winter Months

Stark trees extend their bare branches
Into November skies of steel
Full of tempestuous clouds hiding buckets of flakes.
Falling leaves become falling snow
Until branches are no longer bare
Weighted down by this blanket
In a perfect white balance
That seems it could shatter at any moment.
Bright light radiates through my window when I wake up
Whispering to me 
Of the adventures to be had
In this silent pine woodland. 

My skis carry me through the woods
The frigid air filling my lungs to the brim
My breath painting pictures in the air
As I venture into my white world. 

Northern Lakes are frozen in time
Seeming that they disappear when I am far.
Islands wait impatiently
Stagnant in the frigid blue depths
To be filled again with tents and campfires and laughter.
Windswept pine trees are frozen soldiers
Their loose boughs no longer bobbing in the breeze
And it seems it will forever be this way
Until the snow melts away in late May. 

There is a hidden world under the ice
Alive, constantly stirring
Disguised by the snow and silence
Or by my imagination.

Until I return many months later
Navigating my red canoe through green-canopied islands
The silence blankets the lake, seldom disturbed
Maybe by the low hoot of an owl
Or a rabbit scampering across the ice. 
How lonely they must be
The solitude reaching far beyond the rocky shores
For I can feel it all these miles away.

The yellow moonlight bathes the ice
Lighting up a glittery blanket
That follows me everywhere I go.
It smells like it has been here from the beginning of time
Yet surprises us
Fresh and new, full of adventures
Every year.