Poems by Michael Riedell
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Once Winter
by Michael Riedell
Michael lives in the Russian River watershed in Ukiah, California.
You don’t know winter is over
until it is, until the sun is rising bright again
over the Mayacamas and a friend
is coming over to help drop the dead birch out front,
and you think the weather
couldn’t be better for the task.
But the tree’s dead mostly from lack of winter, you figure,
lack of rain, the water we’ve seen less of
even in the years we’ve been in this house.
So the sun shines clean in a clear blue sky
and before the day’s done the white European birch
will be firewood stacked on the side of the garage.
Remind me on some cold distant night
when we’re sitting content near the wood stove
and burning this birch
that we brought it down and cut it up
on a beautiful spring day
in the middle of what was once winter.
© Michael Riedell