AUTUMN Suddenly our world turns from summery greens under blue skies to sprays of yellow, flares of red under a menacing dome of stormy grey and white. In a neighbouring garden, an entire waterfall of blazing orange leaves is poised to fall, leaf by leaf

AUTUMN

Suddenly our world turns
from summery greens under blue skies
to sprays of yellow, flares of red
under a menacing dome
of stormy grey and white.

In a neighbouring garden,
an entire waterfall
of blazing orange leaves
is poised to fall, leaf
by leaf in slow motion,
from a Japanese maple.

The trees withdraw their magic green
from all those finger-leaves
which craft the sunshine
into juicy sugars which
eventually feed
the entire world.

Those trees whose leaves will drop
begin to break their chlorophyll
down to its separate parts.
They pull the fragments back inside,
storing them in a living skeleton:
stems and branches, trunks and roots,
to wait through the winter, dormant.

When their chlorophyll’s dismantled,
the other pigments in leaves reveal
their flaming orange, brilliant yellow.
Other compounds are brewed anew
to create the deeper hues
of scarlet and purple.

So this season strides our world
in its royal leafy robes,
billowing in the winds of change.
Each leaf’s a patterned fragment
of the warm cloak wrapped around
the future’s sleeping seeds,
till spring kisses them awake.