Heavy dark earth
clogs our boots.
We’re two work horses
treading the furrows. 

Flint beneath our soles,
splintered metatarsal, spine or skull,
of those who trod before
the paths we now take. 

The geese call
mournfully, dolefully,
a ragged cupid’s bow
unstrung in our sky.

I am no longer
as you married me,
perhaps not even as
you would have me be.

Sometimes we kick
and show our teeth.
Sometimes we nuzzle
mingling our steamy breath.

One day we’ll reach
the sheer cliff’s
eternal drop to a world
woven from water.

We’re two shires
in our traces,
resting occasionally
shoulder ‘gainst shoulder.

And when I stumble
as the incline
becomes too much,
I know you’ll tenderly wait.