October
It is the fall. On every street
trees are bursting into flame
and everyone is walking on cinders.
The wake of your leaving
has made shamans of us all
Children come home from school rattling
their backpacks like sacks of bones.
On the corner of my road
they will read your palm for a quarter.
The town bum knows astronomy;
his blind eyes are pointing north.
The geese streak south, then oddly
westward like a dark hand
groping across the sunset.
The porches at night become shrines
to the dead. In the distance a dog barks
then is silent. Unnameable things move
in the shadows.
Out in the study I stand
a dozen effigies in a row.
I perform midnight rituals:
all feathers, flowers and voodoo.
The very hour is bewitched –
In the shroud of morning you arrive
home to ask "How did I get here?"
A dozen roses on the desk.
As you fall asleep your cheek is caressed
by the soft down of goose feathers.
– Jeremiah Gould
© 2008
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Revised 4/8/2008