Look up

Notice that leaf

on an uppermost branch.

The wind challenges

its heroic grasp.

 *

All of its treemates

have long since released

their tenuous hold on life

blowing as they do into

far pastures and lanes,

byways fill with their corpses.

 *

They reveal

as they die

the winter’s architecture

of the cottonwood tree-

A ghost in black relief-

the autumn moon watching

through its arms.

 *

Look up

The leaf is holding on

to what is not meant for it -

Holding on

to this idea of immortality -

all the while losing

its grip

on the one life it has known.

*

This leaf

is one of millions of leaves

come and gone

in this ghost’s lifetime.

*

In autumn we say goodbye.