Molly Fisk: The October Garden

If you were zinnia, still bright

in the October garden, and I the last

orange cosmos. If you were catmint blue

draping yourself over the cinder block wall

and I the weed coming up through gravel.

If you were the bamboo pole, listing

under the weight of late green tomatoes

that will never ripen now, and I

the frayed string that binds them. If

you were heavy purple grapes dangling

over the canted railing and I the feasting

thrush. If you were summer’s echo

in yellow coreopsis and I the tall sedum,

autumn-flushed. If you were the sun

breaking slant over that little grove of aspens

across the street, if you were hummingbird’s

quick wing, if you were winter coming on

or the studious worm and I the turned

earth, the patch of moss beneath an oak,

the oak’s sharp-edged leaf ready to crackle

underfoot, the white-throated sparrow’s

familiar three descending notes in a minor

key, oh, if only I were sometimes

you and you were me.

Copyright 2017 Molly Fisk

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Coreopsis Mercury Rising