Poetry | Welcome Winter

Root River Bdote; Fall Memories in the Soil

We the rooted stand in witness,

Our feet deep in the limestone with our white bone branches reaching high.

We stand with the hills: blood-red in fall,  blood-red at sunset.

We salute you, Winter Spirits, now rising!

Together we praise you, most expert of ancient scouts and hunters,

You who risked death to lure elk and buffalo down this ravine,

You who signaled to the hunters  below on the river land;

signaled to the women ready to butcher, bleed , and smoke.

You whose bones lie here in eternal watch, thinking this would continue forever. 

Now, tractors rumble over your bones and only spirits await below.

Your people still walk the earth, but not on these hills,

not on this river, or the next, or the next.

Still, we continue to stand in witness  and wait …

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Welcome Eternal Blue above me!

These stark limbs behind me endure months

of longing for you and for their own heart beat,

which slid down into the earth.

Dry oak leaves shush a lullaby to the sleeping sap,

while snow crystals sparkle in a blanket.

Is that where fireflies go?

© Jane Skinner Peck