Autumn

I am driving.
Sun cracks the gray dawn
across the Taconic valley
to my right, paralleling the Thruway.

Low mist reflects silver,
a lake in the distance.
So-orange light grows
and the valley widens.

Orange, green, this new autumn,
fall, fall, drop, rest, renew.
Leaves turn through cooling air,
consider coming leaf-rain.

Snow is waiting,
spring is waiting,
summer sleeps,
I trust the cycle to continue after I join the orange loamy ground.

10/2/98