Nature's Faithful

Weighted by a crystalline layer
of ice, delicately frosted with
snow, the glittering burden,
delightful to the eye,
has brought pine boughs
sweeping the winter-gripped
landscape in a graceful swoon,
as though the trees were
distorted in an agony of
pietical adoration of their
omnipotent maker whose nature
it is to visit upon the patiently
suffering forest slumbering
through cold and icy blasts
existential challenges to the
very nature of their obeisance
to this divine authority.