ought um

clustered as for a later season
apples bauble a bark. like the maple
whose leaves rainbow the reigned, bowed
sky, they hang between falling
and staying, still and
swaying.  same goes for a seagull
perched in air, thermals of
summer and winter holding it
like a weathered hand whose fingers
are wings, same goes, sane goes
same goes.  If I say season
is turning, I mean it's a wheel
so think of autumn as a waterwheel
risen from a stream streaming, plunged
to the wheel of water plunging below.
and if you want to know plunged
think of horses, eye, hoof, terror
terrain. Autumn, synonym for change
plunges through us, water, wheel
horses. Seagulls and apples and leaves we
hang in season, pending suspended
disbelief: Autumn
                               ought, um. 

Photo by Richard Burlton on Unsplash

If you liked this poem playing on the sound of ‘Autumn’, you might like a poem I wrote about this time last year called Aw tum too. Happy reading!