Greedy Leaf

He said it was a bad leaf,
shooting out from her brothers and sisters
to catch a ray of sunshine.

She had no business on this tree ——
greedy, not a "team player"
and obviously exploiting the others
who so diligently grew up
so that the greedy
leaf had only inches to go
to reach the warm sunlight.

But lo and behold,
inadvertently the
greedy one gave back
energy to the tree, and ergo,
to her brothers and sisters.

The Early Bird

I look out the window
early in the fall morning
and see only darkness.
I imagine the sun still as bright
as yesterday when I groped
for my sun glasses.
I'm in a shadow, so vast
I can't tell where she ends.

In time, though, my eyes adjust
and I see first the moon,
then the stars,
only to be briefly interrupted
by the headlights of an early bird
driving down the street.

Spotty Shadows

The leaves begin to fall,
as the sun shoots through the trees,

casting spotty shadows
on the wood pile,
where each log waits
for another winter
to find out if they will
be carried inside
to face the burning embers.

At the bottom of the pile
the logs are safe from the fire,
and termites and rot
will chart its destiny,

unless, or course, it is
an unusually cold winter.

Halloween

Trick or treat:
it gets dark early
and the evening is cold.

Gangs of kids move down the street
with a parent often in tow.

It is a fashion show
of sorts, of the latest
monster costumes,

with the oddball kid in each gang,
either too lazy or too poor
for a costume of her own.

Trick or treat, they say,
as the door is opened, and
ah, shucks, we don't want apples,
a moment later.

Autumn Poem Activity

Autumn is such an overused
subject for a poem.

Who wants to hear
once again about
leaves that change colors
and whither and die
or how the weather
alternates between cold and rainy?

Next election, I'm
voting for the candidate
who proposes making
autumn poems a crime.

That will
surely regenerate quite a flurry
of autumn poem activity.

1000 Miles Per Hour

No wonder we need to sleep at night.
Each day we breathe 20000+ breaths
and then we are expected
to remain upright

on this vast planet that spins
on its axis
at 1000 miles per hour.

Each day we see changes from darkness
to light and back again to darkness.

We are but on a rocket
exploding into an expanding space
and then we wonder why

sanity is
something we need to work at
breath after breath.

Dogs

I often wonder what
a dog thinks about
when she sees humans

get into an iron horse
and turn a key and zoom
off into the distance.

Or when she sees
mom and dad kissing
each other.

I wonder what the various
barks and growls say,
but most of all,

what that thought is
when she comes to me
to be petted.

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