What is more elegant than the wind?
Heavy flesh forms a void in invisible currents
as howling jaws weave through the leaves,
a jostling dance, the sinew of autumn that rends
at last the garment of summer, a herald of winter.
I stare through this wind, beyond this snow
silent, aloof, with my patient eyes
for that ordered movement–mouse, rabbit, doe
in this lean cold that feeds and cries
in my velvet ears a desolation . . .
My predatory dignity, no passive restraint,
nor refined repose, but hungry expectation
skirts a gaze across this white wild blanket
for food, for love: My defiance of abandon
is my stillness against the swirling maelstrom.
The winter wolf, I howl not against the storm:
feral vanity wrapped in vocal futility.
No, my paws’ movements echo forlorn,
slapping against this crunching cold: a solidity
that whispers beneath this open tempest,
softly my freedom.