Near the front door of our home in the Northern California mountains,
our cross country skis (unused for several days)
leaned against the wall.
Ski poles, snowshoes, snow shovels
in disorderly array in the hall.
If we put them away for next winter,
spring would bring another storm.
(The neighbors shoveling wet snow from their driveways.
"The weather!" they said
when I passed them walking to the store.)

And in my mind it was thirty years ago,
I was pulling my sled up the hill in the wet snow.
The last storm of winter.

"I am going for a walk," I told Gunter.

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