The wicker chair,
lacy white-on-white,
sits fixed and frozen
on runners
like a Victorian sled.
At the foot
a flurry of past footfalls
is etched in loose snow.

The high horizon where
house, trees, outbuildings
do not slide
but stay in place
tilts right,
under a trapezoid
of blue-gray sky.

Drifted snow
sleeps
in plowed contours
that are reverse esses
while straight rows of
frozen stubble are
scratched
like a five o’clock shadow
across the face
of “A Winter’s Day”.

Where is the farmer
who harvested the past,
the grandmother who rocked
marking the years—
where are those other owners
who can never come back,
because they never really
lived here
the way that we do?