Friday, October 23, 2015

Every Autumn

words fail me. Brilliant color mutes me. I have only senses to see, hear, touch the season.

If I could, I would give word to the Shadow Darners, hovering just above water's surface, or to sky and leaf reflected in calm water.

But I can't.


So I look elsewhere for language.

For the Chipmunk in My Yard

by Robert Gibb

I think he knows I’m alive, having come down
The three steps of the back porch
And given me a good once over. All afternoon
He’s been moving back and forth,
Gathering odd bits of walnut shells and twigs,
While all about him the great fields tumble
To the blades of the thresher. He’s lucky
To be where he is, wild with all that happens.
He’s lucky he’s not one of the shadows
Living in the blond heart of the wheat.
This autumn when trees bolt, dark with the fires
Of starlight, he’ll curl among their roots,
Wanting nothing but the slow burn of matter
On which he fastens like a small, brown flame.

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