Pausing by the cedar stump

tracks came to here:

stopped.

looking back,
it was a crooked path
and snow is melting them,
distortions along the way.

the burned out cedar stump,
hollow now in age,
ancient even then,

sheltered much
in the days
and nights
spent in its safe womb,

(a child's innocent retreat)

but, revisiting,
the old entrance is too small
to allow passage now.

what follows this failing trail?

ahead is westering sun.

if I wait too long
the trail will be as dim
as future's twilight:

present and past,
in diminished sight,
melt poorly
into the arrival of the night.