Autumnal Equinox
Terri Kirby Erickson
There is some sense when
autumn begins,
that the world is being
smothered by a colorful blanket.
Trees lose their emerald
radiance; the edges
of their leaves turn yellow,
orange or scarlet. Days grow
shorter and shadows
linger. The nights come
with a chill like bathwater
left in the tub too long.
Flowers that bloomed in lush
profusion on my front
porch droop like tired children
fighting sleep.
Vidalia onions
and garden tomatoes disappear
from grocery store shelves,
replaced by pumpkins and oddly
shaped squash.
When autumn arrives, winter
Is only a frozen breath away,
bringing cold
and slush, runny noses and hacking
coughs, gray mornings
and twilight afternoons.
It is the season
that swallows summer
like it never was—as if young girls
in sundresses were never kissed
in the moonlight,
or baseballs never soared
over a fence. There were no barbecues
or mosquito bites, sandals filled
with sand on the deck. Autumn
shakes the summer
from our minds until it falls like leaves,
skittering down an empty street.
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