Another Poem About Fall
Sept 23 2009


The leaves change quickly, here,
a burst of crimson, orange
and then they’re gone —
a sodden brown mat,
heavy raking.

The days as quickly shrink;
and me
craving sleep, sweets,
my body still confused
by the end of summer,
winter, coming.

It’s hard to write a poem about fall;
what hasn’t been said before,
and falling leaves
is too easy a metaphor.
North of the Tropic of Cancer
north of the temperate zone,
more rock than earth
everywhere, standing water,
where even the needles soften, drop
as spruce and pine
prepare for snow.
While I grow fat
and lazy,
and frosty nights grow long.

The air, this time of year
is cool and dry,
so the sky at night seems bigger —
stars, laser-sharp,
the black void, infinite.
I become aware how thin it is,
the egg-shell atmosphere of earth;
its frugal warmth
its precious oxygen.

Looking up
through poplar, birch
— bare branches,
which seem to shiver
all through winter —
I snug-up my red wool sweater
that smells vaguely of wood-smoke
and begin to gather leaves;
still wet with dew,
shadows already lengthening.