~~A Cento
Watch the burned, restless, but abiding leaf.
The cone, the curving fruit
should fall away. Wizened orange bitter berry.
Set the baskets where the bough is bent.
The rose remembers the dust from which it came.
My silken outer garment trails
over withered leaves. Autumn inferred, the millinery
of cloud the deeper color in the shawl.
[I] like a world that’s furnished plain, let others
deck them in frill and furbelow…
[I] scan the fripperies of flowers and snow.
Chestnuts, clicking (one by one), escape from satin burs,
her fringes done. The spell, by sunset door, wrapped
in a veil steals back alone for one more song and dance.
Wild black promontories of the coast extend their savage
silhouettes. When for faded joys my heaving breast throbs
with vain pangs, here will I love to rest.
Whatever crosses over… through the wall of rain…
changes, there’s no need for a door since it closes round me
as I go. In the moonlight, each leaf is fringed with silver.
