Autumn

A passing flower of a passing season: red,

blood rich, ferrous and complete,

both floating and falling in a field of verdant compatriots.

A forewarning, yes, a prognostic indicator, perhaps,

but of what? What to come? So it is.

The seasons writhe and gasp, unwitting

of the seasons’ past or those to come.

The seasons clasp that ephemerality

wholly at once, as the son has won.

The red leaf now, bright and pleading,

becomes the precursor of both death and life.

The read lead now, somber and fleeting,

remains the symbol of our time to come.

Which time is it now? A plant unknowing

has but two options: hope or despair.

The latter a corpse, dead once living,

carried inside the city gates.

Bury your dead, mourn and worship,

yet touch not these bodies needlessly.

Down into the bottomless mikvah of the soul does one wash,

yet up into the heavens does its aperture head.

The former is audacious but not hubristic,

a boldness of sight to see the Spring.

Yet Winter is long, harsh, unyielding,

in its own season of seasons to come.

So carry the dead outside of the city,

wait for their time, mourn, and wash,

bury not the living nor carry their bodies

around the maypole of the season that’s come.