Sleigh Ride

Sleigh Ride

In cold, smokey air we walk toward
The old mare, gaping her bridle, bored,
With a slack haunch and hooves raking
White lines in the road and making
Her giant equine tussocks tap
Their vibes deep in rhythms which map
A winding root to my heart’s aching.

The driver clucks, and cracks his whip,
Urging the giant who rights our strake,
And jerks us fro like a small thing in her wake;
She blows white puffs, bobs and sways
Her bell plumed neck which peals our sleigh’s
Moonlit traipse down the tree-lined maze.

What mulls in me I should, too, loudly drum;
These bits of rime in the rents of my face,
Speak tears, not joy nor sorrow, but from
Seeing lights, in pulchritude, pulsate apace,
In currents, glistening, they glisten like her eyes,
Like the doomed gymnopspermous seed dies,
And fades, fading into barely a trace.

But then, my love, her precious arm hides
Barely kind, snugly in mine, now warm.
And quickened, my heart awkwardly coincides
With the powerful mare which my mind formed,
For, there was neither horse nor puffs nor bells,
Just the brewing vigor of Love inside.