Someone had parked a caravan
by the path for trekkers,
in the time of blue skies; of travel brochures.
But today was cold,
the air an icy mist, raw with ethereal light.
How often I wondered,
did the path become impassable?
have lives become unbearable
lost in this harsh white cloak?
In the snow gone blue with cold
tyre tracks and footsteps whisper
their frosty signs of lonely exploration.
Are the hotels full of ghosts?
The rooms filled with the smell of lockdown stillness,
of icy spectres and pre-covid hugs.
Had I a window, a portal to christmases past
to the joy and laughter, of skiing and clowning
companions exhilarated, on ambitious pistes.
But on the raw bleak path, only the caravan freezing
promotes the optimism of blue skies and kind
when groups of friends will meet,
when the inclement times refrain.
