Ode to Autumn

So many colors abandon the earth,
and go skyward to the trees
like origami birds,

scarlet, orange, creased
and folded into the mind
where these paper birds come alive,
the trees quiver a little—

this is where I can
still see you

in these gray branches
with brightly colored
birds that are not birds—envision you

still darning
the heels of Jimmy’s socks
those evenings after school

at the kitchen table when
you’d run your finger down our list—

not here in the duller green
where the last of the pink roses
are browning on the vine,

and along the fence,
your favorite lilies, wilted,

and everywhere
the hungry bees.

From Echolocation, (Plume Editions/MadHat Press, 2018). Posted by kind permission of the poet.