It's Still Life

Hunters in the Snow: The Bare Thorns

February is a wind
that cuts through the bare thorns
of the rose bushes.

Never mind the hum
of small black gnats that possess
the air. .

Better to remember
a rose’s scent. Your father’s voice.
What makes you laugh.

And I set my pen aside
and listened – because I am
the hunter’s earbone.

Ekphrastic poem based on Bruegel’s Hunters in the Snow, 1565. ©Misky 2022 Shared with #amwriting on Twitter