Winter Venture

Winter Venture
1
A gibbous moon is clutched tightly by the branches of the black walnut tree
outside the back door, as we start our nightly walk to the ditch line together.
A slow, talking walk tonight, we are trying to deal with an in-law problem
that is side-tracked when we come to a frozen pond where the cornfield.
should be. Muddied ruts and broken cornstalks had held forth all winter,
to be vanquished by a vast plain of unblemished ice.

Giggling about last week's thaw, we search and find old ice
skates in the barn. Moldered, cobwebbed, frayed laces-no problem:
they are too tight to fall off. We are a caricature of a Currier & Ives winter
scene as we, laughing at ourselves, wobble off across the cornfield.
After a brief, but breathless race out to the solitary apple tree,
John and I collapse in a happy heap, all tangled up together.

The cats have followed, tails high in the night air. Scampering together
they play their version of hockey, now batting, now pawing a bit of ice--
sending it skimming as we relax on the bony knees of the wizened apple tree.
Our house looks different from this perspective; so too our problem
seems different, somehow, less important than this footnote of winter:
gnarled roots digging deep, finding sustenance and strength in the cornfield.

The porch light is a beacon, winking at us, here in the cornfield.
We stand, and I am reminded of why I gave up skating, the problem
still of weakened bones, aching now with more than cold. Still, we ice
slide back towards the light, the two of us and the cats, together.
A far off dog barks and there, just beyond the grizzled apple tree
is a large buck. Full antlered, regal: he has survived winter.

He rubs his head against the knurled trunk; spring itches follow winter.
Ignored , we watch, my hand held warm in John's pocket together
with his. Antlers and tree branches. One abandoned in the cornfield
while the other comes back to life. The buck, free of his weighty problem
thinks no more on it, munching on a frosty, shriveled apple: ice
harvest. Another soul soothed 'neath the old apple tree.

We skated on a cornfield, John says as we lean against the black walnut tree
to put on our boots. Something for my journal, I muse, thinking that the ice
skates will never be worn again, but kept as a reminder for when a problem
troubles me. The kitchen window looks out at the apple tree in the cornfield,
but I had never noticed it before. The cats, ready for milk, wait together.
The air, rejuvenating, bracing, smells of something beyond winter.

The moon has escaped the tree branches as we return together
with no solution to the problem that lead us out to the cornfield,
but it belongs to the winter and spring will soon melt all the ice.

2
The seed planted that winter's night after our skate across the corn field
would come to fruit during the fall: solving one problem, creating a change
we weren't sure we were ready to accept. I watched the apple tree
waiting for spring to waken its winter sleep. The farmer plowed
the mud and cornstalks under, filling the earth's belly with seeds of some
kind or another. We would have to wait to see what would grow.

Pale green sprouted, unrecognizable yet, even as I watched my stomach grow
round. The apple tree had yet to bloom, its branches barren in the field.
Our world without and within began to make ready for the upcoming change
as we rearranged our home and our lives. I found myself watching the tree
constantly, until John said that maybe the spirit of the tree was plowed
back into the ground. I didn't want the apple tree to die. It was some

thing special to me, to us. I wanted to show it to my child some
day, perhaps share an apple. I wanted to watch them grow
together. The sprouts became soy beans and we now had a bean field
outside the kitchen window. Fat with more than milk, the change
in our cat population blossomed. We found a litter by the black-walnut tree
and several more in the barn. We planted our garden after John plowed

under last years tangle of weeds and whatnot. He then plowed
it bigger as I had bought too many tomato plants again. Some basil, some
pumpkins, some muddy jeans and some fertilizer. Our garden would grow
well this year. The afternoon sky grew grey and then green over the bean field
as the predicted storm blew its way east. I felt the temperature change
and my child move, as I watched as the wind toyed with our tree.

The next morning, John walked out to the broken remains of the apple tree.
He brought me the antlers the winter deer had left behind, not plowed
under as we had supposed. I'd felt strange all day and some
time that evening, I had the feeling that our child wasn't meant to grow
further. When we came home from the hospital, John spent hours in the field
sitting on a broken branch of the apple tree. Like spare change

gathered and saved, our lives are made up of moments. A moment can change
the course of our lives or that of an old apple tree.
Our garden grew, tomato plants bursting beyond their cages. We'd plowed
so much into our hopes for a child together, but I guess that some
things are not meant to be. I wondered if the mice population would grow
to support all these kittens underfoot. John says, come to the bean field.

Midst the broken and dead branches, there had been a change.
The wind had plowed seeds deep into some
of the soil. A new apple tree would grow in the bean field.

3
Two years season by. I reconcile myself to menopause and the change
In John, who no longer walks through our cornfield with me;
Who wanders more, is home less, searching on the far side of the fence.
Third generation kittens climb precariously up the young apple tree
Bending branches in their enthusiasm. I walk alone
Watching wind ruffle cornsilk hair; I am almost content.

2:17 in the morning, waking to a softly closing door: he'd left me.
A hurriedly scribbled note, unapologetic, left on the dog pen fence:
He'd taken Tucker too. I leaned against the black-walnut tree
And cried although I wasn't sure why I was crying. It wasn't being alone
For I'd been there before. Perhaps I had grown too complacent, too content
Too trusting, too safe. Yet as the sky lightened, I accepted the change--

Pretending it was for the better. He forgot the leash, tangled in the fence.
Or left it intentionally. Anger flared with the sun. Remember the tree?
What we'd said? Hungry kittens answered me. I held the black one, alone:
Its mother was hit by a Mac truck. I read his note, looking for hidden content
But it is straight forward. No words added, scratched out. No change
In his thoughts. I go to make coffee. Find the divorce papers he's left me.

Ten pages of requests/demands. Irreconciliable differences. Poor tree
To die for this. Scattered branches, forgotten leaves, wind blown, alone.
How anger and regret flow, ebb; unrelenting tides of emotion: Not content
To be battered, yet hadn't I been? Treated like that spare change
at day's end. I curl up, holding his pillow. I smell him and me.
Images shift and regroup: return to the forgotten leash on the fence.

Details. Belongings, longings packed away unsorted, tossed. A lone
Sock, baseball cards, Pinto parts, his Christmas ornaments: the content
Of ten years together in a small pile of boxes. A Change
Of Address Card. I don't want him or his mail here anymore. Just me.
Legalities handled in sterile courtroom: two well-dressed lawyers fence--
Dueling out the settlement. He looks out the window, staring at a tree.

Back to my maiden name; my new, yet old initials spell his name. Content?
No. Regrouping, remembering, resigned. Older plans continue. No change
In desires to finish school, to write, to travel. A same, yet different me.
I left behind the house, the cornfield and the leash still tangled in the fence.
Now I sit on my beach, watching the tides. I have a maple tree
In my yard and the sound of the waves in the night when I am alone.

The tree grows; the leaves change:, they fall, drift, land in the neighbor's fence.
Content where I have landed, my world settles around me
and I reach out, no longer alone.