Lapse

We seem caught up in it, the lull of pure winter.

Crows in the distance, a chainsaw—life somewhere,

but not here. Not a single tremor in the shorn

saplings, not squirrel or beetle shuffling the leaves.

The prey are too cold to eat: mice, rabbit, vole

knotted up under shuttered rhododendron.

The owls and wild dogs will need something soon

but now, nothing moves. Time arrested. Love

suspended. Were a buck to step into this moment,

imagine the hysteria. But this desultory is to be

unraveled not broken: a single hawk swoops down

on a trembling pocket of fur scratching in the dirt

for seed. The ring slips down my cold finger,

a clattering on the floor, and finally you speak.