Autumn Jive

years after,

we come to see that

we were autumn.

we were the first nip,

the verdure in decline

the ancient delicate and delicious apple

first bitten and broken,

the skin soft, the meat sweet, and

the juice undrunk

we were voices through the window,

not frosted but bitten, biting,

cold against my flesh, overripe.

we were the quiet of dusk -

the strangers who dared ask,

the aurora of dark and dusky lament,

lamentation, fermentation, for

its promise

hibernation, and the hard, cold

sleep of early snow

we were the distance, yawning,

singing, swaying in the breeze,

the first breeze, the first nip,

the unbitten, biting

the unsung, singing

and the hush

the skreak and skritter

we were cool water

we were trucks in the rain

we were fabric spun from unbleached, pure fabrics

biblically pure, for no reason,

for all seasons, for this season -

autumn, we greet you.

we are you,

we sing you each year,

weave baskets from your hair

autumn, welcome again to the world

pleased to meet you, inside,

under the awning, yawning, crawling dextrous through forests in decay

autumn, we are you, and you are the infinite

your primordial hum,

is the same vibration as the planet dancing,

monk man down from his mountain cave,

the season's slave.

I sing good morning to autumn,

good mourning to autumn,

mourning dew, morning do

wake to find a new season,

same old season, though years have passed

this is a song of autumn,

for those that couldn't tell,

and the whole sublime, chords,

skelton and minor keys,

apples and spice, apples browning in butter,

squash and pumpkin, gourds and baseballs

(which are really the same thing)

but a song of autumn can't help but be a song of spring,

so don't mourn for the morning,

and don't sing for spices,

know only that we've fallen,

that the fallen must be the ones that rise