Ears and Cups
Cool for late summer.
The cold leaves listen,
hang like ears
laden with rain,
but it’s not the rain that weighs,
for there’s a heaviness
in the reddening trees.
Ears and cups
but mostly ears.
In backyard hedgerows, animals
are still, unless they are disturbed,
moved on.
The leaves curl, fill with silence
and when the cups on their brown stems
tip,
more weight descends.
The trees are waiting.
The leaves are waiting.
The cool mornings gradually warming,
but not until
Micky D’s stops serving
breakfast,
not until Gas Stations
are out of regular coffee.
does the listening
pause,
the heaviness pause.
In the suburbs
landscaping crews are stiff until noon,
heads creak on brown stems
as they tend to the edges.
It is uncommonly cool.
The leaves twist and tip slowly
draining a silence,
until
two-stroke motors
are punched
or a fretful yell
cuts
then the listeners are moved on,
disturbed to another place.
Copyright © Eric Ashford | Year Posted 2020
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