Wolf Laurel

Tree branches ice-shackled, ground

hard as an anvil, they leave

the hearth's huddling heat, three sons

and a father, wade through snow

two miles upland where they cross

Wolf Laurel Creek, poke rifles

in rock holes, cliff leans hoping

to quarry what's killed five sheep,

but no den found as the ridge

sips away the gray last light

of winter solstice, and they

head back toward home, the trail

falling in blur-dark, and then

the father falls too, heart-locked,

wrist unpulsed, the sons without

lantern, enough lingering light,

know they must leave him or risk

all of them lost, know what waits

for death in that place, so break

a hole in Wolf Laurel's ice,

come back at first light to find

the creek's scab of cold covered

with snow-drift, circling paw prints

brushed away that sons might see

a father's face staring through

the ice as through a mirror.