This is how the year ends,
This is how hopes fall apart.
Thin black lines scratched on white paper
Indicate a bridge, a hill, a forest,
A village deep in snow.
No smoke rises above the steep white roofs
That seem to grow straight up from the frozen earth
Like plants left out for the winter.
The walls of the houses are hidden beneath the
roofs,
And not one door or window can be spied.
The cold feet of the weary travellers
Have not been sketched, or even indicated
By the quick hand of the 19th. century artist
Who often worked with one eye on the clock.
He was concerned that drifts were deep that year,
And getting prints out to his rural punters
Was not be an easy task.
The transport system was somewhat rudimentary.
The travellers trudge towards the snowbound village
Neatly built behind a pale red fence,
On a bend of the mountain road,
A road not wide enough for laden horses.
This fence, it seems, is the only dash of colour
The artist splashed on an almost monochrome scene, -
Monochrome, that is, apart from the lifeless river
Reflecting exactly the blueness of the sky.
No traveller has a companion to converse with,
It seems every man is left to fend for himself
In the infinite solitudes
Of this desolate road that climbs the frozen heights,
But this is how an old year generally ends,
On a lonely day when Hope is clad in tatters.
Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
December 2nd. - 3rd. 2021.
Hiroshige print illustrating December on my 2021 Calendar.
