Somewhere the path turned from forest, to brush, to tundra
Then to the breaching pink granite of yesterday.
The features are familiar and the scrub trees fill the same crevices
The glacial radicals, still sentinels that are always watching.

I can still gather together the sticks to light a fire
And it warms me against the northern chill air
The swell of rock is cold beneath me,
And my body is a poor reservoir from which to warm it.

Already the moon of November is here
Though the calendar hasn't yet announced it.
It comes unbidden with piercing icy tendrils through ancient trees
All silver and platinum and stainless steel.

An inky lake laps at the base of the granite whale's back
An intimacy born quietly over the millennia.
Of a petrified swelling-surface relaxing under the pressure,
Of jack-pine root fingers snaking through ancient seams.