TODAY....

Today, I walked back on the farm for the first time in almost two months. Back to the three great sisters, still sleeping under the worsted brown of last fall's stubble. But the hills were not as I left them in December, baked hard from summer drought and winter cold. Today, I snuck up on the three sisters and found them soft and malleable, their sinews loosening for the work ahead.

When the wind paused to catch its breath, I could hear beneath the snow's crust the gurgle of life in the veins of the great hills. The three sisters are waking and breathing and drinking in the snowmelt.

Waiting.

The long inhale before spring.