A Fun Year for Toads

At Real Toads, The talented Ella, of Ella's Edge, set us a challenge, on this special day for frogs: to look around us at the shapes and colors of our morning and write a poem from them. The description of the challenge can be found here. As nature kindly deposited a thin layer of snow overnight (which is really going to piss off the crocuses that have been coming up), this was an easy write.


A thin crispy crackle
of icy snow
crunches underfoot
as I walk to the barn.

The old horse
pushes her big long nose at me,
whiffling for carrots or apples.
There is a busy twittering
of winter sparrows
at the feeder,
and steam is rising
from the pasture
as the morning slowly warms.
Beyond, the tops 
of the blue hills are 
draped in snow.
A wintery breeze  
blows off the slopes
and catches 
my uncovered neck.


It is February 29, 2012.
What will morning
look like
on this day
in 2016?