It is the wrong time of year for a woodland walk. It’s too late for leaf-crunching, too short of sufficient snow to follow animal tracks. And there is no longer a Gus Ben David to identify tracks if there had been snow.

It is also far from the time when the occasional crocus appears, though rumor has it that snowdrops have been seen in Vineyard Haven. Since I’m now 93, with far less agility than when I was younger, I have been walking less and reading more. Two lines of poet Robert Browning’s that I have come across, cheerily suggest that I “Grow old along with me; the best is yet to be — The last of life, For which the first was made.”

I certainly take issue with them. Then I remembered romantic poet William Wordsworth’s lines: “One impulse from a vernal wood, Will teach you more of man, Of moral evil and of good, Than all then sages can.”

And so it was that, with those lines  in mind, I had bravely set off for the woods near Glimmerglass Pond the other day. Walking to see the waterfall there and occasionally glimpsing a swan or two bobbing on Glimmerglass used to be a daily morning excursion for me. This time, that walk took me awhile but I made it — hoping that the lone star ticks were gone.

It wasn’t the easy walk that it used to be, but as I crossed the bridge over the Tiasquam River en-route to the woods, I was delighted to see ducks swimming there. Once in the woods, as I descended to the bridge over the waterfall, I was somewhat unsteady. A favorite rock of mine carpeted in green moss seemed, this time, to be in my way. But I remembered Wordsworth’s poem and made myself pause and admire the rock’s downy carpet as I always have. Sadly, though, it was somewhat squashed by the cane that was propping me up.

On the other side of the bridge, I passed the big tree that was blown down decades ago and left upended. It is far too early, of course, for skunk cabbages (the hermits of the bog, as they are sometimes called) to be erupting from the swamp nearby. Seeing them waking as spring comes has always been a highpoint of a walk to Glimmerglass for me.

I passed several holly trees and looked for red berries on them, but there were none. I have been looking elsewhere lately for some to bring indoors now that Christmas decorations are down. As usual, I crossed over what now is Mark and Liza Duke’s property to find my way back to Music street and then back home. Mark offered me a ride, but I declined. Afterwards, I mused about my walk.

I surely had not enjoyed being so slow-going, despite Browning’s poetic claim of happiness in old age. But I was fondly remembering Wordsworth’s assurance that “One impulse from a vernal wood” would  be a joyous one in any season and at any time in life.

And I was gratefully recalling the late Walter Houghton who, for years, was a Chilmark home-owner. A Wellesley college professor of English it was he who had introduced me to the Romantic poet, Wordsworth.

I was glad, my age notwithstanding, that Wordsworth had tempted me out into the Glimmerglass woods on a wintry, windy day!