A semi-truck, half-overturned, blocked the road. The driver’s cab, dangling on its broken neck, had slid into a ditch, its nose pressed against the indifferent forest. I stopped and stepped out of my small car. Coming closer, I saw the driver inside the mangled cab, pinned in an unnatural position between two seats. With effort, I pried the door open and helped him out. He muttered, as if accusing me of something, that he’d been hopelessly freezing there for nearly four hours.
-----
Upon that road, forgotten, cold, and wide,
Where naught but shadows and the frost abide,
I sped, through woods where winds like demons scream,
And silent trees stretched forth their limbs to deem
The earth beneath them barren, lost, and lone—
A desolate stretch where none had ever flown.
Then, lo! Before me, halted, firm and still,
A mighty truck lay trapped, against its will.
The wheels, lifted up high, as if the heavens frowned,
The metal beast had tumbled, earthward bound.
Its cargo—frozen—locked within the grave
Of twisted steel, where none could hope be saved.
The driver, pale, within his cage of cold,
His limbs so stiff, his breath a tale untold,
Had spent the hours in silence and despair,
While winter’s breath did mock the frozen air.
“I’ve waited long,” he said, with voice so faint,
“I’ve waited long, for freedom’s kind restraint.”
But ere the sun could sink beneath the lea,
I reached him, hands, though trembling, firm and free,
I opened wide the door, though shiver’d soul,
And bade him rise, though all the world seemed cold.
Yet words between us neither rose nor fell—
What need of speech when all the world is still?
A truck arrived, a salt-streaked carriage bright,
And plowed the road to ease our frozen plight.
But though the salt may thaw the bitter ground,
The woods, and all their whispers, lingered round.
And as I drove, the silence grew and swelled,
The same as it had been, the same as it was held.
No grand event, no tearful words of thanks,
Just shadows in the woods, where darkness ranks,
And in the stillness, deep as any tomb,
We leave the road behind, its endless gloom.
-----------
I drove the road where no one else would go,
Through winter woods where cold and silence grow.
The trees stood bare, their branches stark and long,
As though the world had left them, cold and wrong.
Then, truck ahead, its black wheels ralling high,
The body half in snow, beneath the sky—
Pale frozen driver being trapped inside,
His breath like smoke, his hands unable to hide
The numbness creeping through his frozen veins,
A prisoner to winter’s icy chains.
I slowed and stepped into the biting air,
Where shadows of the branches filled the square
Of time we share, and none could say a word—
The quiet like a song that’s never heard.
He’d waited hours, alone, beneath the sky,
His fate uncertain as the night went by.
“We ain’t working today,” I said, and sighed,
While in the cold, the hours seemed to bide.
I opened cabin's door, a crack of light,
And helped him free, beneath the dull, gray night.
A salt truck came, its hum a steady sound,
But still the forest held its weight around.
The road, the truck, the driver all were gone,
Yet still the trees, the woods, the silence shone.
No words to say, no grand, heroic deed,
Just one small act to fill the quiet need.
And though the cold still clung to every breath,
The road ahead stretched out, a road to death,
Or life, or something in between. Who knows —
The woods will take what time and frost bestows.
-----------
I drove the road where no one else had gone,
Through woods that whispered of a time long passed,
Where frost hung like a memory, heavy, still—
A world forgotten, fading into glass.
Ahead, a truck lay stranded in the snow,
Its wheels raised high, a monument to loss,
The driver, pale, his breath a cloud of fear,
His frozen hands a testament to cost.
I stopped, my thoughts adrift in cold and time,
Where shadows seemed to gather, thick and wide.
The trees, as if they knew, bowed low, resigned,
Their branches tangled, searching for a guide.
"We’re not working today," I said aloud,
As if to say the world had shifted, changed,
That time, once moving, now had paused its course,
And now, I was the one to rearrange.
The echoes of our shadows circled near,
Spinning in dizzy dance that knows no end,
As urgent tasks dissolved into the air,
For one man's suffering, I chose to mend.
In stillness, where no ticking sound could play,
I held the weight of someone else’s plea.
The world could wait, the burdens be delayed,
For random mercy sets the spirit free.
The door I opened, though my hands did shake,
And helped him out, as though the day would break.
The salt truck came, its hum a distant song,
and woods stood still around us, deep and long.
No words of thanks, no praises to be heard,
Just silence thick, as if the air had stirred.
In that small act, a world of weight was lifted,
A breath of life, where all had once been shifted.
And though the road ahead seemed dark and cold,
The forest held its peace, unspoken, bold.
No grand event, no joyous tale to tell —
where stillness fell.
----------
I drove the road where no one else would be,
Through winter woods that dripped with cold and loss.
The trees were grey, their limbs as bare as bone,
As though the world had turned its back, and tossed.
Then, up ahead, a truck lay still, half caught,
Its wheels half-buried, trapped beneath the snow.
The driver sat inside, pale as the frost,
His breath a cloud, his hands too stiff to show.
I slowed and stepped out into biting air,
Where shadows of the branches reached and fell.
The quiet hung there thick, a heavy thing,
Like something waiting, waiting to be well.
He’d sat there hours, time too cold to count,
His fate a shadow stretching past the dusk.
I am here to help, I said, he heard, half dead,
While time, like snow, was caught in frozen husk.
I opened the door, I cracked it with my hands,
I helped him free, beneath the dull gray sky.
A truck came by, the salt spread thick and wide,
But still the woods stood silent, asking why.
Yet shadows murmured of a darker hour,
A tale of death, of breath returned by force.
A man, once buried, stepped into the light—
And from his rise, the quiet world took flight.
But in that moment, when the door was moved,
A gust like bitterness through silence proved
That power, once unleashed, will cleave the stone,
And those who tremble carve their fate alone.
The truck, its grip now shattered, loosed its hold,
We stand, entangled in a dream too cold.
The resurrection, like a fading cry,
Awaits the eyes that never seek the sky.
No cheers, no thanks, just silence, like a tomb,
The weight of time still heavy on the air.
And though we left, the forest kept its gloom,
A place of endings, still too much to bear.
-------------
The road pulled me in, as though it sought my name,
Through woods that whispered tales of things long gone,
Where branches reached like fingers, cold and tame,
And frost lay thick, the air so still, so drawn.
Ahead, a truck lay trapped beneath the sky,
Its wheels raised high, a monument to snow,
The driver pale, his breath a ghostly sigh,
A prisoner to the cold, nowhere to go.
I stopped, and time seemed frozen in its course,
The woods, the air, a silence too complete.
In that still moment, I felt fate’s strange force,
A path that turned, and now no task could cheat.
I opened the door, my hands too cold to feel,
And helped the driver out, as though the world would bend.
The salt truck hummed, its engine faint, unreal,
But still the woods held all, as if to end.
No thanks, no cheers, just something quiet, deep,
A weight that lingered where the silence grew,
And though I left, the naked woods still keep
The winding road, so black, so cold, so true.
