Autumn expires In its own fires
simmering the fallen with flaring tints.
Leaves crepitate and crackle
skived to crisp skins.
Hedgerows turn to vacant
crypts, twigs to wooden teeth.
Arboreal embers swirl
between barelegged winds.
The groundhogs have forsaken
dawns scant larders
they seek deeper shelters
where moss-beds lay unseared
by smoldering remnants.
Halloween will be late this year,
the dead are still dying.
Hawk-watching crows gather in dark drifts.
Hedge rows rattle, we see through
to where the wind is barelegged,
to where campfires smoke in cooling cavities.
Autumn flavors its dwindling stores.
Groundhogs carry sparrow bones
from one naked shelf to another.
Bushy-tails hurry headlong into the late
scattering unseeded shells.
Death mellows the mottled.
Thresholds curl into entrances
where damp crows circle.
I can see through the hedge
where the wind is barelegged.
A groundhog carries sparrow bones
from the bare shelves of dawn.
Halloween will be late this year
the dead are still dying.
Gorse rusts, brush burns its colors.
Time and it’s bustling creatures
curls now into pockets and vestibules.
Leaf doors open releasing sky to fall
as they flame.
Hawk-watching crows gather in drifts;
see-through hedges appear, yet twigs
are still olive and whittled raw.
Hawks fly beyond the rooftops.
The hedges rattle, we see through
to where the wind is barelegged.
Campfires smoke in cooling cavities.
Autumn flavors its dwindling stores.
Mist-warm velvet wombs seed the far unseen.
Groundhogs carry sparrow bones
from one naked shelf to another.
The lake is a tsimmes; boats, babies, and fish bob in white wakes.
Ah but, the sandy shoal, the small fish nest beneath and beside the docks.
The lens of lake divides but why chose when both are a joy?
Squeals of delight hang humid air steams the Sunday sunbathers.
Barbecues char hotdogs and burgers ladies strap-stripped, barelegged.
Coconut oil on skin or grilled meat wafts both are joyous smells.
Bob Marley on the breeze teens necking on the boulders, hot.
The roar of powerful engines or the driving pump of nubile hips.
Catch the colors, eye the scene you sit reading with a smile.
First Published in Pithy Pages For Erudite Readers Summer 2014
I was barelegged with you in a field this morning.
You couldn't have been a day past five.
It was I who helped you navigate the long grass,
the dips in the soft, unseen turf,
you who found the ripe blackberries,
spread across your face like war paint.
Or was it your high school?
You walked off the grounds for the last time,
a sheet of paper pressed between leather
under your arm as your books always were,
I wore a simple floral top and black slacks,
a proud smile that just wouldn't come off.
I can’t recall. But no matter.
It's 4 o'clock , another sunny Monday,
that day after Thursday,
when that kind young man
who looks so much like you
always brings warm apple pie
just the way I like it.
He should smile more often.
The sizzle of the griddle
amongst the chitter-chatter
of nubile meanderings
The St. Francis rocks
rocks the soda POP stops...
This fifties Fonzi haunt
for the twenty-first century's gaunt
feeds the bellies of San Francisco's dreamers.
Amongst a milkshake swirl
stand pretty girls
tee's rolled up tattoos unfurled
on lollipop like pedestals they twirl
unwinding like wet red and white paper straws
barelegged or blue-jeaned.
The St. Francis rocks
rocks the dinners scene.
Was it the tanned cheeks
The sun bright eyes
The softly parted smiling lips
The careless stance
Of barelegged ease
Or was it just her blowing hair
That caught my eye
Made my heart dance
In quick unease
Who was this girl
To take my life
My soul
My wife
In one fell swoop
Of sweet perchance
So few
and many
Years
Romance
From such a lucky day