Michelle Barnes is hosting the Poetry Friday Roundup at Today’s Little Ditty
The farmhouse, winter or 2018
The first blast of winter arrived last week: snow, ice, and bitterly cold temperatures. I had been preparing myself for attending to farm chores (what I refer to as “barning”) in winter ever since last winter, my first such season spent full time at the farm.
There were practical things to do in preparation: move the chickens to their winter coop, purchase heated buckets so that all my critters could have access to fresh water instead of blocks of ice, and prepare the sheep stall with deep bedding for warmth.
And then there was the mind set preparation: hauling out all the gear necessary to stay warm, to keep the pathways clear, to be ready to trudge over ice.
Each season here in the north east has its distinctive look and feel, and although I love the colors (and warmth!) of Spring, Summer, and Fall, there is something about the stark beauty of winter that I have grown to love since moving to the farm. The evergreens, lost among the greenery of oaks and maples and birch during the rest of the year, make their presence known with grandeur. And the landscape makes itself known in an entirely different way when it’s under a thick blanket of snow, especially on moonlit nights.
I guess I’ve learned to listen to winter…
The Snow Man by Wallace Stevens
One must have a mind of winter To regard the frost and the boughs Of the pine-trees crusted with snow; And have been cold a long time To behold the junipers shagged with ice, The spruces rough in the distant glitter Of the January sun; and not to think Of any misery in the sound of the wind, In the sound of a few leaves, Which is the sound of the land That is blowing in the same bare place For the listener, who listens in the snow, And, nothing himself, beholds Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.