Stones counted and stacked in a humble pile Between an old milk carton and switchgrass. I have known every one of them before they Were here; cold, lifeless, and still. They moved with rhythm, soft and steady, Footstep over dead branches, no noise But the warm crumble of soil against And between toes. They spoke in voices, hushed as fading Cigaretes, and laughed like leaves blowing Through the willows and turning against The cliffs. They were motions of quicksilver and Moments of flagstone, sudden but sure To feel for the right grasp and hold on to ropes And bookeshelves in the cold. Surging so much like stormclouds Bounding across the broken sky in billows, In puffs rolling into more summer justice Jagged in the certain blue. That was then, in the cherry-sweet spring, When a daffodil was broken in two, Shared for each petal to be placed in the cupped Hands of the wind. Lifted away past the eyes of geese And bluebirds winging back home, Until the yellow becomes a past event landing In a distant span of rocky earth. Now we are here, back among the burnt orange Of autumn, when I can see the skeletons Shaking off their verdant shrouds, when I can See through to you, hidden for so long in the flickering shade. I look forward to the snow, awaiting foot prints For the permanence of that sinking To the ankle, the wet reaching in above the Boot to remind us of the stones living Underneath. They come in all sizes, from a thumbtack to A paperweight, so I choose carefully, making Sure I leave the thin ones aside, placing the thick Tumblers first, letting them dig hollows in the earth. From there I build, until all that is left is The sliver of stone I almost neglected to see, lost As it was by the antmound in the weeds, But I searched twice, and now the stacking is complete.