Footprints in a Winter Forest

A winter forest, and on the snow, water deer tracks run in two lines. Someone walked this path ahead of me and went on. The prints are not so small. The place where folded knees pressed into the snow, a branch where wind-blown fur has caught. I stand beside the tracks and look the same way. While the path it took goes on, my steps don't enter it but follow along the outside. The prints don't scatter; they stay evenly deep. I can't hear the snow falling. What I left in this forest was not footprints but only the place I stayed a while. In air clear as ice, I stare a long time at where those tracks lead. In the forest beyond, where the moon shines lonely, the prints grow smaller and I stand longer. Until the edges of the prints blur.