Birds hop two-legged
on crisp drift tops
animals criss-cross between
hot-footing spoors as frozen melt
with dexterous tailpiece sweep at back
defacing giveaway tracks

Impelled to scrunch two random lines
unsettling pure snow scenes
- vandal, spoiler, lone Crusoe
just checking that I've been

26 thoughts on “Twin trails”

1. I love this, Laura. It might shadow Mckenzie’s poem, but your poem stands alone. Such a beautiful winter scene, with a bit of philosophical whimsy. Thank you!

   1. thanks Merril – I shadowed at a distance!

      1. Well-done! I can’t even see the tracks. 😏

         1. ha-ha 🙂

2. I love the way you used the inspiration of the other poem to make your own tracks in the snow (or following the birds)

   1. thank you, Bjorn, tried to make it my own with just a nod to McKenzie

3. Absolutely love the way this piece elevates imagined adventure. That is some thing I would love to do when I was young and we would have a deep smooth clear snow. I also enjoyed the way the poem turned on itself face-to-face. Excellent Laura.🙂✌🏼❤️

   1. thank you Rob – yes tracked all the way back to childhood – though I would still do this if we had deep enough snow

4. “New snow” for us as children was to play the game of catch or chase, “Fox and Goose.” Make a circle with a few spokes, in the middle tramp snow for base. Make the paths more exotic as the game progresses.
   ..

   1. fascinating turn of the tracks Jim

5. Both poems are lovely as they tap into the delicate beauty of snow and contrast it with the heavy-footed human “spoiler.” I also like the metaphor here as we bumble and stomp through life, oblivious to all else but ourselves. Beautiful poem and deft shadow to Alex’.

   1. Lisa – your interpretation of the metaphor is excellent – thank you!

      1. You are very welcome, Laura.

6. Love your take, so much to analyze with the imagery! 👏👏

   1. appreciate your comment Tricia because it seems such a simple poem at first sight

      1. My pleasure, Laura! 💖

7. Shadowing is a great idea for a future prompt, Laura, and I love where your twin trails took you. Those ‘crisp drift tops’ made me shiver! And I love the juxtaposition of bird/human poems, the oxymoronic ‘hot-footing spoors as frozen melt’, and the use of the onomatopoeic ‘scrunch’!

   1. I appreciate all that you saw in this, Kim – many thanks and yes an idea for the MTB prompts and since I’m down for a few future ones, I might just do that

8. I love this Laura! I can just see you in your boots, out walking in the silent snow, leaving tracks and looking behind at them. That pondering at the end….delightful.

   1. thank you, Lillian – snow trails doth make existentialists of us all 😉

9. “vandal, spoiler, lone Crusoe”
   I love that line, has a musical quality to it, particularly that internal rhyme between “lone” and “Crusoe”.
   JIM

   1. I appreciate your appreciation of that line Jim – one I was best pleased with as it came rolling in without much thought – hadn’t noticed that internal rhyme though so thank you

10. What a wonderful write, Laura! We don’t get snow here, so I enjoyed very much ‘hot-footing’ through your imagery rich verse.

    1. thanks for hot footing in your imaginary snow boots!
       such scenes are from my childhood as and sadly even in this more Northerly Isle such deep snow is now mostly confined to the hills and far North

11. I love “a corduroy of tracks”! Wonderful poem, Laura.

    1. me too – wish I’d written that!

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