Peter Blair: Variegation

Maples flash yellow,
dogwoods bright red,
sweet-gums blaze
orange around a single
oak, holding on
to its recalcitrant green
deep into fall.
 
            *
 
A scarlet blur
on the gravel driveway:
a woodpecker
cracks an acorn
against a stone,
head-crest waving
like a tulip
mounted
on a jack-hammer.
 
            *
 
After rain dries,
the shadows of leaves
star the white cement,

some stenciled
in sharp tannic imprints,

others blurred
in charcoal swaths:

ghost leaves.  
 
            *
 
October moon in a pine.
Its needles vein the Sea
of Serenity. Cicadas 
whine in the darkness:
pulse, stop, pulse,
an Om for insects, feeling 
their first cold wind.
 
            *
 
black leaves fall
from a bare tree,
in secret sequence
they veer and rise
until the next tree is alive
with the yacking
of migrating grackles.
 

Peter Blair’s collections of poetry include Farang (Autumn House, 2010). He lives in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Copyright 2021 Peter Blair