One day — as the leaf — I must unfurl
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One day — as the leaf — I too must furl
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Crimson-orange — to brown, to softly verge;
borne upon the rustling wave of wind,
upon the tide of Autumn's chilly surge
to wander errant, murmur, and to send
the crackling reassurance of a kiss
unto the pavement, and to stuttered paws
bestow their fragile bodies to the bliss
of dissolution, fragmented by laws
of pressure and divine nostalgia.
What artist makes it through the aching Fall
without a poignant-sharp glossalgia?
What sensitive ignore the clarion call
of frost and colors turned of leafy flame?
The same as them, I burn with fev'rish tongue,
with paling lips that tremble towards the name
of that which sits above the highest rung,
of that which perches through eternity
and watches all the leaflets growing old,
and breathes the innocence and enmity
of child-life, quick-gathered moss-an-mold,
and slow-dispersing lover's chemistry.
Verdant leaves a few must always stay;
though run through with the blackness of decay.
Others piece with shine of lemon'd ray,
though tinged with heavy mark of deepest gray.
I am one who breathes upon the leaves;
I am he who dozes at the eaves
of palace overgrown, imagined home
of soul elusive, after weary roam
upon the marbled planet shall conclude:
I am one who turns at ling'ring mood
to stare the proper star into its place,
the pieced puzzle of far outer space
and there too, surely fall etheric plants
in rainbow'd progeny, to stately dance
upon the rare and soaring atmosphere,
at planet's-end to shed a diamond tear
commemorating changing of the hues
of every atom radiant with blues,
with seafoam, crimson, pink, and tangerine,
with indigo, and white, and black pristine,
with em'rald and with silver-twining gold,
by all the waking colors deep-ensouled.
I contemplate with them the gliding leaf
across infinity with grace but brief,
ephemeral — with sorrow-drenched joy
to overcome the metaphysic ploy
with transformation brilliant to behold,
and I am blinded — I am all controlled
by turning of the pages of the breeze,
by rolling of the sheaths of cosmic wind,
by flutter of the page upon the scroll
fair-scribed by angelic, callous ease
and for a moment I cannot pretend
to know but shadows of the holy tree,
and all the wonders mortal orbs can see
soft-crumble as the dessicated leaves
of Autumn bind in quick, disloyal sheaves
to make the fodder for a gloried Spring.
Yea, of my own ineptitude I sing,
yet, too, of living hope and promised Truth
to whosoever asks, a balm forsooth
to calm the fickle animal within:
O let me leave the empty world of men!
and journey with the winds forevermore
across the blooming universe of trees:
O bring me humble to complacent knees
and show me all the panoply of Love,
and let me sweet-ascend to Thee above.
words and photos by @d-pendcreated for HIVE on Oct. 9th, 2020.
