Ephemeral Ice
Michael Gollin
March 2015
***
Ephemeral ice floats
gray, ringed by water,
then the lakeshore
narrowed by spring rain flood,
then the asphalt trail.
Canadian geese gather in a gaggle standing walking flying swimming.
Honking, pushing 100 strong,
they never really leave.
Webbed footprints, w’s in
slush, diverge in a V.
An odd oblong resolves into
shell head and legs,
a turtle
(a Red-bellied Cooter
I deduced later, red obscured by mud)
crawling from the shore water
on the edge of the ice
towards the middle.
It turns left and crawls,
left again through puddle on ice, heading back to water! but left again, his double trail a 9.
A prophecy?
Then left again towards the geese and left again
an expanding spiral then
Plop! back in the water
and safe mud.
A day of hard to figure where to go.
Sun is warm but ice is cold.
***
innovationlifelove 
Shoot, Michael — I was hoping to be first to write about that turtle! What a lovely poem. Really, just lovely.
It would be happy to have another poem. The lake is melted now.
Let him try it on Lake Erie: http://www.bing.com/search?q=frozen%20lake%20erie%20images&pc=cosp&ptag=AC31D31446D&form=CONBDF&conlogo=CT3210127
But in DC, the Cherry Blossom Festival starts tomorrow!