Butler Pennsylvania 6


Winter Afternoon


The sounds of your mills
have reached me
at night
and sometimes
I think I hear the steam engines
stomping in the yards
out behind the hill
or whistling like they did
at the crossing by the creek
on entering town—
but never did I see a sky
like yours
on waning winter afternoons
when I, a boy of four
would find myself standing
at a frosted window
scratching through ice
then staying there rapt, gazing
until light had given way to darkness.

 



Next          Home