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Dead of winter

It was one of those winter days. Clear, cold, the sun frigid and bright. A
day you'd have said you'd never forget. Almost snow-blind the man drifted along the
way, stiff fingers shielding his eyes. The ground was like slippery stones, but
under the thin and soft white cover it was frozen mud you'd have found. But
Francis didn't look.

In his back the moon was rising. Two lights now shared the world, but one was to
go down soon, you'd have said. He remembered a child long ago in Wabasha, ages
before he was born. Going to school in the early morning, the boy would
deliberately leave the road. Francis almost couldn't lift his feet anymore. But
the boy walked on untrodden ground, leaving fresh traces, only to discover later
that all the other people followed his newly created path across nature's
wedding dress...

Too tired to keep on, he sat down on a tree trunk. ... rather than the well-
known road. It may well be that his eyes suddenly became heavy, and his lids
started to vibrate just a little bit. Had there been an open fire, he could have
survived, Francis thought. He could have looked out of the window, then, at the
most exquisite scenery with the sun in the far west and the moon rising above
the plains... Had there only been a hut. ... with the immobile trunk like a
comma on a freshly printed page. After a few days however the boy decided to
shorten the path, approaching the common road. Out of his pocket he took a few
grapes and grinded his teeth on them. The boy learnt well... How sweet the
grapes tasted! ... and never lost the way. Francis felt how peace came to his
heart that you'd have said had stopped beating and pounding as night fell.

Somewhere along the copy'n'pasting roads these words had to travel linebreaks emerged where they really shouldn't break anything. I restore the original three long long lines... (of course without lifting the veil of Poet#21's anonymity... )

Tom

Dead of winter

It was one of those winter days. Clear, cold, the sun frigid and bright. A day you'd have said you'd never forget. Almost snow-blind the man drifted along the way, stiff fingers shielding his eyes. The ground was like slippery stones, but under the thin and soft white cover it was frozen mud you'd have found. But Francis didn't look.

In his back the moon was rising. Two lights now shared the world, but one was to go down soon, you'd have said. He remembered a child long ago in Wabasha, ages before he was born. Going to school in the early morning, the boy would deliberately leave the road. Francis almost couldn't lift his feet anymore. But the boy walked on untrodden ground, leaving fresh traces, only to discover later that all the other people followed his newly created path across nature's wedding dress...

Too tired to keep on, he sat down on a tree trunk. ... rather than the well-known road. It may well be that his eyes suddenly became heavy, and his lids started to vibrate just a little bit. Had there been an open fire, he could have survived, Francis thought. He could have looked out of the window, then, at the most exquisite scenery with the sun in the far west and the moon rising above the plains... Had there only been a hut. ... with the immobile trunk like a comma on a freshly printed page. After a few days however the boy decided to shorten the path, approaching the common road. Out of his pocket he took a few grapes and grinded his teeth on them. The boy learnt well... How sweet the grapes tasted! ... and never lost the way. Francis felt how peace came to his heart that you'd have said had stopped beating and pounding as night fell.

And thus I lift the veil. This prose-style poem has been handed over to Linda's interthingial care by me.

As I understand this poem, it is a relating and a description of someone lost in frigid winter and dying of hypothermia using a title that has a double meaning. I found the use of a phrase repeated "you'd have said/found" marked the distinction between the experience of the subject (Francis) and the experience of the observer. This had the subtle effect of providing two viewpoints in this story.

Cheers, Witty.