Covered bridge

(Arlington, Vermont) Sunday morning past the black shuttered Bed and Breakfast on the Battenkill past Swearing Hill, goldfinches in goldenrod August and the hip booted fisherman casts, casts. As we pass three deer in a high pasture scare into woods leap like the fisherman's line, bends. The river rides past barns, farmhouse with cow bells nailed above the door and here, the covered bridge. All lines and angles hide wooden arches, square bolts big enough to hold the world together, biggest wooden pegs this side a tree's legs, keeps this cathedral holy over the emerald cold as Vermont marble. In Danby We crossed a bridge as fine as any king could want, cut and polished white marble only miles from the mountain it made. The sound was smooth. No boards said their name and asked whose horse we knew. No roof gave us care from the cold air, kept away rain that sang to the charging river, nor birds in barns slept so warm.