AUTUMN

"All of us have been dying, hour by hour, since the moment we were born. Realizing this, let all things be placed in their proper perspective... Remember, it is always later than you think." Og Mandino

"The hollow horn plays wasted words
Proves to warn
That he not busy being born
Is busy dying." Bob Dylan



Mid-afternoon:
The sea smoothes
The crumpled land
With foaming briny fingers
Limpid, languid, listless.
Drowsiness at three o’clock.
Distilled in the drone of a bee
Drifting to a distant field
Where golden rounds of hay
Stand separate as men
Like giant sandcastles
Tempting a naked foot to stamp them out.
A glinting jet weaves a vapour trail
Stretched out across the clear blue,
Blue-sky dome:
A subtext of mortality
On an autumn day.