"TOO WARM FALL"

All this fall is a mealy apple

My teeth beg to snap and break the white fruit
in satisfying explosions

 

There is no air to make me stiffen, draw me
taut like a rope
and chill my lungs with
silver flames

 

On the trail, the grass still obliges my feet
Friendly like spring

 

I want it to push back.  I want to hear the 
grinding sound of my boots
over shards of nuts and twigs, 
The cracking of frost
on solid blocks of earth
I want Pangaea to reform
and start again.

 

How will the wood frog check- in
to his little ice hotel?

 

The wind has lost her cape of icicles and is 
looking, flustered and 
fretting

 

The down and wool hang drowsily in my 
closet, like women
growing older

 

Only the rustling shell is worn

 

Tonight in bed I call to 
Antarctica, to the emperor penguins
in their land of blue snow.  
I ask them for some ice to keep
and imagine it clasped in my hand
Unmelting like a diamond

 

But it is the gentoo’s eye I come to crave
Its pale, cool ring enveloping black 
can mean only one thing:
Winter