First vacation

We wake to a mist that clouds the river road, hovers over a field of soft-spun spiders' nests. Blackbirds beat and skirt the trees, collect in kite-tailed flutters and streak over hay bales spread out in dry fields like small matchboxes burning the mist into a gold blaze. A ghost moon trails us into the mountains, rises with us through yellow aspen. White faces of cows flash through forest walls. And everywhere the trees bend down whispering.