Dark Silent Woods

There's a brooding, sullen air
in the forest, the air heavy with
early dusk, shadows deep dark grey,
trees standing stark against the sky
roiled with dark clouds, an urgent
wind rustling stubborn oak leaves
refusing to fall upon the blanket that
squalls of thick-fallen snow left on
the forest floor. No birds sing in the
silent woods. Only the crunch of
boots on a trail where the light is
failing; the creek within the fold
of the ravine ripples on its frigid
journey to the great rivers beyond
the margins of the winter-sleeping
forest. Above the dark sentinels of
trunks reaching to the heavens a
sliver of moon appears, dim yet 
but well defined, hanging low and
luminously silver, its light not yet
able to define the landscape below.