Turning

Leaves cascade to the ground,
a small music,
played by the wind;
it has begun,
this turning,
detaching
and falling
to freedoms
complicit with windy whims.

It is just the beginning
—we must be clear about that—
the start of a dialogue, a transition;
each leaf, as it turns,
glows, even as it fades
under the Autumn sun,
and, dying, dries,
and when it falls,
this is only a newer
hello,
the very latest one.

A slow dance,
this seasonal song,
is merely one of nature’s
many conversations;
the cold breath of Winter
may find an answer
in the winds of Spring,
or a balmy reply
on Summer’s sunny crest.

To turn,
to burn;
to prance
and dance,
unpinned
by the wind,
upended
(mayhap unintended)
and made free
to flee and be
and to become,
with all and some,
wholly changed material,
electrically ecstatic and
eclectically charged
for both the now and next.

© 2013 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen