Skating Alone

 The split rail fence was still broken where I had fallen through many years ago.

The pond it surrounded was now receded, lowered, no source to feed it anymore

Tying the laces on my skates, I wondered if the ice would hold me. Carefully, I glided, listening to the crackling surface.u

The shush of the blades joined with the shivering ice creating music in the absence of other skaters.

Long ago, laughter and first love floated in the air but finally, time took it's toll.  

Children grew up. They left. The pond and land settled into loneliness.

Decades passed, awaiting a return, any return. And I, an unforgotten thin reed of a girl was now a woman, grown.

Loneliness faded into shadows and my pirouette was enlivened by memories surrounding me, a haze from long ago.