THE ESKIMO FROG

It was the first warm day of Spring,
An awkward time of the year,
The ground still covered with snow,
Yet days full of hope
That warm weather was finally here.

Impatiently I sat inside,
Watching the outside,
Observing the warming day,
And decided to walk to a nearby meadow,
To see if its icy cover
Had finally melted away.

I walked through the trees,
Dodging patches of ice,
And slowly began to know,
That Winter’s firm grip was softening
Into slushy and melting snow.

Walking over a little hill
it finally came into view.
A special little meadow,
Covered with liquid puddles
Of freshly melted snow.

T’was then I heard a sound
I’d never heard there before.
T’was the "ribbit, ribbit, ribbit"
Of what must have been an Eskimo Frog.

It sat on a shriveled tuft
Of last Summer’s dried brown grass.
Yet its feet rested in an icy pool
And I stopped rather than walk past.

If a normal frog had sat there
In that icy yet liquid snow
It surely would have worn a pair
Of warm and wooly underwear.

A normal frog would’ve worn socks
And Froggy galoshes, too,
Made of foam insulated rubber
To keep its feet from turning blue.

A normal frog would’ve worn a pair
Of bun warmers from its waist to its knees,
To make absolutely sure
That its tiny toosh didn’t freeze.

But since ice rims edged its pond,
This was no ordinary frog,
And it seemed to chuckle and chirp
As the springtime sun
Burned away that morning’s fog.

It must be far from its Eskimo home
Could it be visiting here?
Did it come here just to view this spot?
Did it hop through the snow or not?

At no other time was there water near
Normally t’was bone dry.
And it had to hop miles to get here,
Unless it knew how to fly.

Not a summer home for a local frog
So it must have come with the snow.
And now that the snow was leaving
I felt it would soon go.

I listened to it chirp and sing
And it made that meadow ring.
But then as the sun sank out of view
I knew it was time for me to leave, too.

I said "Goodbye" to the Eskimo Frog
And walked back home to my fire.
And though its singing soon faded behind,
That little frog stayed in my mind.

Later that night while warming my feet
I was thinking about the frog.
I wondered if it had enough to eat
As I banked my fire with a log.

Looking out my window
My porch light aglow,
Something caught my eye
And I began to know.

It was twenty degrees in the night outside
And I couldn’t believe my eyes.
T’was a little moth flying there,
Fluttering along without a care.

I realized then that’s not so strange
"Cause frogs eat moths.
Our Eskimo Frog was probably awake,
Hoping to dine on a fuzzy moth steak.

Eskimo frogs chasing Eskimo moths
Throughout the night in the snow,
As all night long we sit by our fire
Thinking their world’s asleep
under its blanket of snow.
****