Some Things Begin in Autumn

                    If not begin again, at least they try anew:
                    Plucking fragments of a life near spent,
                    tearing shreds of past regret,
                    mind open, groping for words.

                    Repent, she said. For what,
                    I asked, and hurried on
                    lest she reply.

                    Why venture here, behind
                    the cool night autumn air,
                    where meadows vastly unprepared
                    submit to snow?

                    Regret, she said, the chances slipped,
                    heat without warmth.
                    I hurried on.

                    Some things begin in autumn.
                    Not, as you had thought,
                    all things prepare to die,
                    some use remaining energy

                    to scatter seed, and winter come
                    they dream, as poets do,
                    of immortality.
 

Copyright © 1999 Miryam Ehrlich Williamson. All rights reserved.

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