Over the years
I have become familiar
with this old country house,
this farm on the edge of true wilderness,
and the climate
of this northern land,
skimming the Arctic Circle

I have become accustomed
to these out-of-town circumstances
to a degree
that it goes without saying
at which stage of fall you should turn on
the geothermal heating,
and how you sense
that it's time
to fill a few cardboard boxes
with firewood
out in the woodshed
and bring them into the house
to land them
by the wood stove in the living room,
to be prepared
when the great outdoors grinds its teeth
at temperatures too low
for the geothermals to accommodate you
comfortably,
having you load a few birch logs
into the Bruno Svensson stove
for immediate sweet relief,
the ceiling fan spreading the warm air
into the kitchen
and the other rooms,

while, at grimmer times,
the dark deep winter dome,
full of the glimmer of stars
and the moving curtains
of magic Aurora Borealis,
refrigerates your habitat
below minus 30° and 40° C,
acquiring you to light up the big wood burner
in the garage building across the yard
for some emergency survival heating,
requiring you to duck out there
once every hour
to feed the roaring beast,
until the water in the tank simmers
just below boiling,
filling the pipes and radiators
in the system with hot water
and the house with good warmth
that will keep you safe enough for the day
that you can fall back into reading poetry
or composing some ill-witted cut-ups
or distorted drones to your own
and nobody else's liking!

In a similar way, through the years
since we met in 2009,
under the magic Nallo Mountain,
(meaning Needle in Sami)
hiking the wild north of Swedish Lapland,
I've come to know my wildlife Wildwife Anna,
her delicate mood shifts
and her tremendous talents
and widespread skills,
scattered across so many fields,
artistic and technical;
her mastery of tricks
to manage the heavy machinery
and everyday chores
of a farm in a rough land,
with horses and all kinds of
severities,
while maintaining a full-time job
as a physiotherapist
at a hospital 40 miles from the farm;
her way with words,
her mountain stories
that first had med captured
and lovesick;
her drawings and paintings;
her intriguing knit works;
unbelievable woolen sweaters
crammed with her own detailed mountain motifs;
her way of always finding solutions;
the way she skipped her longed-for
mountain vacation,
- her annual leave from work -
to take care of me
when I'd fallen off a horse
at age 69
and broken my back badly,
making sure I returned
to the land of the living
from major surgery;
her senseless energy
climbing mountains and screes;
her intellect sharp as a shining
samurai sword;
her thought faster than a shooting star;

and her patience
through periods of physical pain;
a grandmother on mountainbike
in this brown bear country
(droppings just 200 yards from the house);
the nocturnal tracks of fox Yannis
and deer John
in curling wildlife notations
in the snow
right 'round the house,
out into the garden,
spiraling 'cross the pastures
into the coniferous forests
of eternity,
to return next night,
silently passing
just yards from our sleeping bodies
in the Great Ship of Dreams
upstairs

And we amplify each other,
Anna and I,
up these oldtimer years,
where I have become part
of place, people, animals,
in good time
for Time to hike the raven
and wing away
into the dusk and dawn
of forever