frost rime, moss, and shatter'd
limb
tall spruce a wanton guard

our thoughts like steam from
broken mouth
trail back to summer's yard

while wait and lie and wait
again
the ridgeline constant scann'd

and bow and blade and axe near
by
and fires held low, not fann'd

with voices soft and breath kept
close
and furs and leather clutch'd

we swore and begg'd to gods we
knew
and others we knew not

'til dawn a misty lifeless haze
broke forth her frozen glow

and through the mouth of Hell
itself
the first of them did blow

like leaves before a horrid
storm
the Roman legions came

yet worse, alas, before the crest
a beast we could not name

bore down upon us cruel and
fierce
and widely gaped its maw

the cane corso Romans bred
to rend us tooth from jaw

my axe a useless feeble limb
no strength to give it seed

no time or space to swing or
slash

but time afresh to bleed