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LEAVING
They don’t do that here,the leaves do not demand to be seenonly in their chosen seasonsand their palette is self-limited.There is no budding in spring,no malus or prunus throwing offwild cascades of white and pinkpainting the ground around them.There is no riot of coloras summer retreats and winterplans its eventual arrival,blazing reds and oranges,yellow, ochers…
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A FROSTY RECEPTION
I truly wish Robert Frost was still aliveso I could ask him where he foundthat yellow wood of his poem.The woods I know are mostly pinein the Adirondacks, or mixed hardwoodsand when autumn arrives they greet itin shades of green, red, orangeochre and yes, some yellow,but hardly enough to givethe forest that titular color.And even…
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HEAVEN KNOWS
His extended wingsmomentarily block the sunsetting his feather tips ablaze.His vermillion talons graspthe waiting branch threateningto break it from the treeunless is bends to his will.His curved beak archesagainst an orange skyholding tightly tothe retreating sun.I can only watcha majestic momentand believe that somewherethe must be a Godfor nature alone could notconceive of a creatureof…
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WINTER?
In the early morning, beforeI open the blinds, beforethe sun approaches rising,I imagine the chill envelopingeverything outside, Octoberslipping quickly towardNovember, to the possibilityof rolling snake eyes, to snow. Winter always came that way,unannounced, and at leastby me, unwelcomed, thelast of the crimson, flameorange and ochre leavesdragged to the earthand buried ignominiously. But I know when…