The Woodsman

The night breeze ebbed and flowed. Rising and falling. Rustling leaves followed by silence. Rising and falling. Unseen clouds blocked the starlight, and the big woods was dark as a womb. A final gust whistled through the tree tops, and the first glimmers of dawn appeared in the east, silhouetting a tall burr oak that took form. The screech of a blue jay pierced the silence, announcing the birth of a new day.
The woodsman hesitated on a knoll to absorb the scene before him. Mist shrouded the pothole slough in the low ground. Straining pond moss through their beaks, a greenhead mallard and his hen dabbled along the icy edge. A pair of gray squirrels foraged for acorns, disturbing the sheen of frost that masked the yellows and umbers of the fresh-fallen blanket of leaves. A red squirrel scolded from his perch on a low branch, tail arched high with the appearance of a monarch on a throne.

Return with the woodsman to the hills, to the woodlands, to his memories.