So there we were

Karl and me and the baby Katy

Not such a baby, four years old. We

Moved into a shack on Brookfield Pond

With our dog Benjamin, the cat Teeda

And four geese.

All citified except for the geese.

The house was heated by a wood stove but we didn’t

Have wood

Or money.

In the winter when the town plow went by

Snow came through the cracks in the walls.

The toilet froze.

We thought it was an adventure.

As soon as the ice on the pond was solid we took a sled

Chainsawed down a tree on the shoreline, a dead elm donated

To us

And split the wood

Standing out on the ice in the wind

Using a maul and sledgehammer. We

Stacked the logs on the sled and towed it back to the house.

Elm is tricky to split

Doesn’t burn awfully hot

But it kept us warm enough

That winter.

And some years later

We got countrified.