Fire to Frost

Poma dat Autumnus: A Triptych

0312.2013

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I. The Slow Burn

Autumn sets a slow fire to the land—

Carlina’s meadow burning into vine,

nightshade crawling up the arms

of trees that no longer beg the sun.

Stone and timber wear their habits—

honeysuckle, rust—

purple wood curling at the feet

of earth turned to hardened brioche

then cracked open by time,

eggless, and bare of bloom.

The wind forgets its voice.

A spider strings the hush—

the quiet silver pulled taut

from dusk until its dawn.

Flame comes like blades,

orange and yellow petals falling

from the hands of the dying.

II. The Shadows

Autumn favors shadowed places.

It runs fast-footed into sorrow,

steals the color from Rose and Cardinals—

and melts them into copper,

bronze,

the alloys of dusk.

It lends its metal light

to its red-rebellion

marching toward winter.

Its rivers are plum-dark.

Its waterfalls, lilac and frost.

The fruit of its womb—

Drunk.

Bruised.

Made to warm the teeth of bone.

Spice floats through corridors

of stone,

through chimneys that exhale

clove, ghost, and memory

into forgotten kitchens.

Where once a flower curled in bloom,

a sea of crystal prepares to sleep.

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III. The Liturgy of Dusk

I watch nature turn her key.

A crow calls into sky’s quiet ruin.

A raven drags its soft black cloak

toward a blackberry crown.

The sparrow mourns—

sings light back through shadow.

Rain touches my window

with long, tired fingers.

It hums something almost-kind,

almost-remorseful:

“Autumn,

you glorious thing.

You brave and crumbling thing.

How precious your time is—

Ambrosial.

Vanishing.

Born to die.”

m.c.f.