After

She pulled the rabbit
from its burrow and cut
its throat and let it bleed
over the untouched snow
the poor thing must have
tried to just escape from
for the season.

There was no reason other
than the hunger that she felt
while looking through her cabin
window at the falling snow
that stretched far out for miles
over everything there was.

While she cooked it in the fireplace
her dog watched every stir
around the rusted metal pot
she saved forever.
This was the weather that would end them
it hadn’t been that cold in a dozen generations
and her creations in the nearby woods
would all be torn apart with lack of care
and the persistence of the wind.

Looking in at her without a sign
and by design was another frozen eye
wore out by cold and always doing
what it’s told. It gripped the branch
so tight its talons slipped past
all the solid matter it connected with,
and hypnotized itself with nothing
but her movement through the windows
and where she goes it would always
follow after.