Still Life: Whippet & Man

They make a fetching pair
with their obvious zest for life,
their exuberance on the woodland
trails packed with newfallen snow,
on a cold, crisp, sunny afternoon,
he in snowshoes and her fine
shapely legs bare to the frigid air.
Both are ecstatic with the winter
landscape. They are young, lean
as whippets, and exceedingly engaged.
She whips through the snow-laden
trees happily abandoned to love
of life, traversing double the area
he manages, moving swiftly over
the puffy snow. Among the birds that
flit through the trees, a tiny kinglet
stops to observe them. The wind
looses snow patches from their perch
on dark branches, showering a veil
of snow on the pair intent on claiming
their place in this world of light
and snow palaces, a publicist's dream
scenario, if nature needed one.