Mark.

Wyeth, Untitled, n/d

LATE SEPTEMBER

The leaves grow lighter and lighter,

yet they fall. As the woods thin

a house becomes visible,

and a plume of smoke hand-feeding the wind.

There's no hurry if you don't care.

For thirty years nothing knew paint,

but the house still stands.

What is dust, that we should mark

if it fills our empty boots while we sleep?

Children love you at first the way a dog does.

But eventually they will reveal

the history of your offenses

in high voices that carry across the pond.

Day opens and closes like a camera shutter,

mechanically, with more haste than necessary.

The cat lays a chipmunk at the back step.

I think of its burrow, of all it hoarded,

and of nine consecutive lives without remorse.

Connie Wanek