Autumn Rain

Rain carried by cool wind
Soaks right through
Reminding me winter is serious
Now, autumn calls us again
And in case we are not listening
Sends exhausting discomfort
Through a day you just can’t dress for
A shiver that leaves you empty
Cold and wet on the inside
Huddled and stiff on the outside
With no promise of any chance to ever return
Into the plenty of summer’s warmth
Or the fullness of a dry fall’s belly

Black crows flap wildly
And pull slowly over the top of red leaves
Loosening their grip
In the numbing cold and wet
That folds over the lower branches
Of young summer grown trees
Everything moves with exaggeration
Wet, uneven wind reminds me
That everything is changing
And I am uncomfortable to feel
Uncontrolled power inside this change

Fall colors flip awkward
This way and then that
Across wet ground
Against the crows flight
Tree shadows carelessly painted in colored leaves
Lie askew but even and flat beside their trees
Torn off and tossed by a damp gusty wind
That has done its very best
To draw a tree’s shadow using leaves
Just as the sun would have done
With its light
When fall was only a dream

I notice below the wind
Salmon quiet in their stream
Silent on their journey
Moving calm but steady upstream
Through the inevitable joy
Of fulfilling a destiny
That must have been imagined
As I stand here warmed
In colored autumn rain
No certain destiny in mind