As we grabbed shovels to clear the path to the office this morning, we noticed a distinct line of big bird tracks in the snow that had drifted across the front patio. A crow had clearly walked in the freshly sifted snow right past our front door. Around the corner under my feeders, more tracks, smaller, of songbirds hopping in the snow after seeds.

All morning, no birds
but tracks in the snow,
runes cast for the new year.