October 31, 2017

if it's okay with you, I'm going to stay happy *

Do you hear the sound of the world breaking?
All that fury in the floorboards and rupture in the walls. Even our hearts
in the throes of their own keening lamentation. This morning, a hard wind
came through the trees, cutting their flock off at the neck. So much color felled
and foiled, this once-sweet season turned bitter in less than an hour.
It was easy - too easy - to imagine this a harbinger or metaphor, to close the door
to the bunker and count the remaining rations. But the sky was so adamantly clear,
almost delirious with optimism, as if refusing the ruin gathering
at its feet, and I wondered if, perhaps, I had misjudged the sorrow of the leaves,
and they'd landed precisely, thrillingly on time.

* I stole this line (with permission) from a condolence card my friend Jean received.