Winter Field

Withered trees,
shriveled ice,
winter sets in.
Cows with crows
fill the fields,
their future stilled
in ice and stalled growth.
Chewing,
thoughts wheeling,
seeking food.

Spring; earth stirs.

A Short, Short.

Hunting a new spot, my husband and I broke into a clearing after losing the trail we’d been tracking for hours. He stomped off, muttering something about women not mixing with hunting, or some such drivel.

I stopped at the edge of an old fire pit, littered with faded wrapper covered cans of beans, an old fork, and part of a cast iron pan sticking out of the dirt. I love old stuff, and always wanted to stumble on an abandoned site to explore.

What were the people doing here? What were they doing now, were they still alive? I pondered and made up stories while my husband paced, anxious to get back to the hunt.

The edge of the clearing held an old shed half covered with ivy. Young trees grew into and out of the open window. The door lay on its side, having fallen off its rusted hinges long ago. I worked my way through tall grasses and bits of broken wood into the shed, hoping to find even more goodies like those that surrounded the old fire pit.

It must have been an old tool shed, part of a hardened hose still hung on the wall, a bent up rake, and an old rusted axe head sat on a shelf, and a few traps, rusted from disuse, hung from the rafters. A partially broken toilet huddled in and among the weeds growing in the corner. Snugged against the non-window wall sat an oddly out of context old chest freezer.

Certainly no power ever reached this remote clearing, so what exactly was it for? Was it…

My husband, impatient and ready to leave, yelled at me to get going, or he’d leave without me. That rat!

With a renewed interest in hunting, I left the shed, and promptly filled that old freezer. 

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Authors Questions - Does this short, short satisfy? How would you rather this end?

Comments, both pro and con welcome.