I
suppose you call this time fall.
It’s
always autumn to me. Your alien mind
likes
to speak in a distorted tongue.
And
when we see the spinning leaves
drifting
down an eggshell sky
I
catch oak, and your hands are empty.
There
half the houses stand empty,
you
say as you watch rain fall.
There
the world is bigger than the sky,
with
room for my restless mind.
I
know you pine for maple leaves,
for
bittersweet syrup on your tongue.
The
words are waiting to leave your tongue.
This
land is small and your heart is empty.
That’s
why everyone ups and leaves.
This
place is paradise after the fall,
There
you can be naked. No one would mind,
no
one would see you bare yourself to the sky.
Through
the window is my perfect sky,
the
places that come easy to my tongue,
If
we left maybe no one would mind
but
me, I say. But if your land is empty
who
would catch me in your wondrous fall?
If
your land is perfect, what fool leaves?
One
day I will weave from leaves
a
tapestry of your autumn sky.
We’ll
go where poplar and maple leaves fall,
where
every red and amber seems a tongue
of
flame, and where the world is empty
and
gives space to your fragile mind.
Perhaps
after a time I would not mind
my
future in a place where everyone leaves
but
you and me, where the world stands empty
but
for us. I’d give you my entire Eastern sky.
Words
slip easily from your honeyed tongue
and
I think, after all, that I may fall.
I
cannot mind your perfect pale blue sky,
your
autumn leaves, your ever altered tongue,
You
make me fall. With you, I am
not empty.