The Winter Runner Poem by Sheryl Deane

A gloomy day awaits the runner
Shivering, his restless eyes focus
Far ahead, to a distant summer

The winter sun glows moody grey
Presiding over a grassy park turned white with eerie frost
As silence pauses, and waits for melting footprints to appear
Green and onward, crunching open the silvery trail

The start gun fires and away he goes
Leaving behind a trail of mist
The sound of pounding feet mows
Overgrown paths littered with stones
Crusted in mud and held by shoelace
His pace quickens to outrun the sinking sky

Too late

Sheets of cold winter rain beat down
Washing the heat from his eyes
Blurring the distance
While soaking feet splash unseen
In birthing rivers of cold beginnings

The finish line flags flap
As a fire rages inside his legs
An unquenchable thirst burns
All the way to the end

Eyes wide in quick focus
His paces lengthen and with a bounding leap
He collapses triumphant

First place in the rain