For Miriam

I I climbed to your high village through the snow,
       Stepping and slipping over lost terrain:
Wind having stripped a dead field of its white
       Had piled the height beyond: I saw no way
But hung there wrapped in breath, my body beating:
       Edging the drift, trying it for depth,
Touch taught the body how to go
       Through straitest places. Nothing too steep
Or narrow now, once mind and muscle
       Learned to dance their balancings, combined
Against the misdirections of the snow.
       And soon the ground I gained delivered me
Before your smokeless house, and still
       I failed to read that sign. Through cutting air
Two hawks patrolled the reaches of the day,
       Black silhouettes against the sheen
...